Oakland City, IN – The Mighty Oak's women's basketball team played host to the #6 ranked Marian Knights on Tuesday at the Johnson Center. It was a hard fought, exciting game that ended in an 76-63 defeat. Oakland City, now 6-5 overall and 3-0 in conference play will travel to Pikeville and Ball State to end 2023.
Oakland City's
Jayla Dowell started the game strong scoring 10 of the team's 13 first quarter points, she continued to be a force in the second quarter finishing the half with 16. Defensively, OCU held the strong shooting Knights to 3-11 (27.2%) shooting from behind the arc in the first half and limited defending National Player of the Year, Ella Collier to only two first quarter points, she finished the half with 11.
The Knights turned 14 first half turnovers from the Mighty Oaks into 17 points to take a 39-23 lead into the half.
In the second half, Senior
Marissa Austin got things started by getting to the line a few times early in the quarter. She finished the game with 12 points, going 5-6 from the line and adding in three assists and a steal.
Marian was able to extend its lead to 17 points following a layup from Kinnidy Garrard with 7:44 remaining in the third quarter but the Mighty Oaks would not go away. Oakland City's
Emilee Hope had a team high 22 points on 8-13 (61.5%) shooting and shot a perfect 5-5 from deep. She scored 16 points in the third quarter and twice helped cut the deficit to only eight.
Trailing by 10 heading into the 4
th quarter, OCU continued to fight hard on every possession trying to complete the comeback. Marian's leading scorers, Ella Collier (25pts) and Abbey McNally (13pts) seemed to have a response every time the Mighty Oaks pushed to close the gap in the second half.
A made three by
Kyrisha Hay followed by a
Marissa Austin jumper, again cut the lead down to 8 with 6:51 left on the clock. Oakland City did a great job cleaning up the turnovers, committing only 4 in the second half and the defense kept things close with 8 steals in the final two quarters. Despite a never quit, inspiring performance the Mighty Oaks fell 76-63.
Following trips to Pikeville and Ball State, Oakland City will be back in action for a full slate of conference games in 2024.
