Rutgers Ends ISU?s Season, 69-58

DES MOINES, Iowa? No. 7 Rutgers shot 54.2 percent from the field en route to a 69-58 win over Iowa State Monday night in the second round of the NCAA Tournament in Des Moines. The Cyclones fell down early and played catch-up throughout most of the game, cutting a 12-point deficit down to five points twice late in the second half. The loss ends ISU's season at 21-13.

"I want to congratulate Coach Stringer and her outstanding team," ISU head coach Bill Fennelly said. "I also want to thank the NCAA for inviting us and all of the people in Des Moines, and certainly all the Iowa State people who put this together. Even though we lost the game, I couldn't be more proud of my team."

A cold start by ISU helped Rutgers take an early 14-6 lead. The Cyclones committed four turnovers and made just 2-of-its-first-8 shots from the floor in the first seven minutes. Heather Ezell connected on a trey at the top of the key with 12:28 left in the first half to cut the lead to 14-9.

The Cyclones did their best to hang around, but had no answer for RU's Kia Vaughn. Vaughn had her way in the post, scoring 14 of the Scarlet Knights' first 22 points on 6-of-8 shooting to help RU take a 22-14 lead with 9:02 remaining in the first half.

RU went into halftime with a 39-31 lead behind a 53.6 percent effort from the field, including 22 points in the paint. Ezell kept the game within reach for the Cyclones, scoring 16 of ISU's 31 points in the opening period. Ezell was 5-of-10 from the floor, while the rest of the team combined for 5-of-14 shooting.

"Heather kept us in the game," Fennelly said. "The thing we talked about playing an outstanding team like Rutgers, you need everyone to play at high level. We got that effort from Heather in the first half, and we ended up down by just eight at halftime."

An 8-4 run by ISU to begin the second half shrunk the RU lead to 43-39 with 16:20 left in the game. Ezell hit another 3-pointer and Amanda Nisleit tallied a conventional 3-point play to account for six points in the run. The Cyclone run was abruptly halted by the hot shooting of Epiphanny Prince. Prince scored 10 of RU's first 12 points of the second half, including back-to-back 3-pointers that turned a four-point game into a 10-point Scarlet Knight advantage (51-41) with 12:45 left in the contest.

The Cyclones trimmed the lead to five points (59-54) on a pair of treys from Alison Lacey and Nisleit at the 5:01 mark, but back-to-back buckets from Matee Ajavon and Essence Carson put the Scarlet Knights back up 63-54 with just under four minutes remaining in the contest.

ISU got the lead down to five points one more time (63-58) with 1:28 left, but RU sealed the game with a breakaway lay-up from Vaughn with 0:19 seconds remaining.

Vaughn led all scorers with 23 points, going 9-of-12 from the floor. Ezell paced the Cyclones with 19 points, making four of ISU's nine shots from downtown. Nisleit added 15 points and Kelsey Bolte grabbed a career-high 11 boards to help the Cyclones outrebound the bigger Scarlet Knights, 30-25.

"It's hard to know your season is over, but what these fans have given us cannot be forgotten," Ezell said. "We lost the game, but for them to come out and support us like they did this season, it will be something I will never forget. It shows how loyal our fans are."

Team Stats

Heather Ezell

Amanda Nisleit

Alison Lacey

Kelsey Bolte

Players Mentioned

Kelsey Bolte

Kelsey Bolte

Heather Ezell

Heather Ezell

Heather Ezell

Alison Lacey

Alison Lacey

Alison Lacey

Amanda Nisleit

Amanda Nisleit

Amanda Nisleit

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