No. 11 Kansas State and Iowa State women’s basketball put on an overtime show for the 5,497 in attendance and national viewers on ESPN, but the Wildcats were perfect in the extra five minutes to block an upset bid and win, 87-79, at Bramlage Coliseum on Thursday night.
“Great game. Obviously, that’s an understatement,” head coach Jeff Mittie said to K-State Athletics after securing K-State’s fifth 20-win season under his direction. “Both teams made a lot of shots. Proud of our group because when you have the lead in regulation, and you feel like you missed an opportunity, it’s not always easy to come back out of that, but our group stayed really confident.”
K-State extended its home-court winning streak to 14 games. This is tied for the eighth-longest win streak overall in program history and the fifth-longest in Bramlage.
K-State (20-2, 8-1 Big 12) had big performances while missing star center Ayoka Lee with injury as five players scored in double figures led by senior guard and All-America candidate Serena Sundell with 23 points on 10-of-19 shooting, eight assists, four rebounds, three steals and a blocked shot.
“I’m a huge Serena fan. I could be president of her fan club. If I was voting tonight, I think she’s the player of the year in our league,” Iowa State head coach Bill Fennelly said. “She just knows how to play. She plays the game the right way. The game looks easy to her … I’ve told a lot of WNBA teams they’d be crazy not to draft her. She’s just one of those kids that I think has impacted not just K-State basketball, but our league, and just a tremendous player and I’m glad she’s a senior.”
Sundell’s roomate, sophomore guard Taryn Sides, came off the bench to fill up the stat sheet with 17 points on 6-of-9 shooting including a perfect 4-of-4 from distance, five rebounds, five assists and four steals. Fellow Sophomore guard Zyanna Walker recorded 11 points, seven rebounds, a steal and a block, while seniors Temira Poindexter and Jaelyn Glenn each tallied 10 points.
The win allowed K-State to bounce back from losing a perfect record in conference play after stumbling in Boulder last weekend.
“The last time we lost, there wasn’t time to dwell on it, since we had to play DePaul less than 24 hours later. But this time, we had to sit with it for a couple of days,” Mittie said. “In the Big 12, we always talk about not letting one loss turn into two. You have to get back up, practice well, and do the right things. I thought we practiced better as the week went on.”
Iowa State (15-8, 6-4 Big 12) trailed by seven, 71-64, with 2:46 to play before putting together a 7-0 run to close out the fourth quarter to square the game. Then, K-State would overwhelm the Cyclones with a 6-of-6 performance from the field in overtime to capture the frame, 16-8.
The Wildcats took control of overtime five seconds into the session with a corner three-pointer from Glenn. After a defensive stop with 3:22 to play in overtime, Sides buried her fourth 3-pointer of the night from the left wing for a 79-73 lead.
Another defensive stop from the Wildcats led to a layup from Sundell with 2:14 to play and an Iowa State timeout. Following an Iowa State layup, K-State faced a rapidly descending shot clock. Sides took a dribble to the baseline and beat the shot clock with a jumper in front of the K-State bench and angled from behind the backboard bringing the crowd to its feet as it gave K-State an 83-75 advantage with 1:26 to play.
“I knew time was running out, and I was thinking, we need to get a shot up,” Sides said. “I took it into my own hands. Someone cut through, so I came off it and thought, ‘Man, this might hit the backboard, not gonna lie.’ Then it went in, and I was like, ‘Nice, nice.’”
The Wildcats pushed its lead to 10, 85-75, after an acrobatic layup from Sundell with 48 seconds left. The roomate duo of Sides and Sundell would each make one free throw to ice the game.
“I was struggling to hit that turnaround jumper, so my teammates did a great job of finding me in a different way in the post, like with that lob when I had a smaller defender on me,” Sundell said. “That’s a credit to Taryn, I think, for making that pass. She saw there was no backside help, and I had the whole other side of the rim to finish. That was a fun play. It was fun being in the post with that senior mentality.”
K-State will play the first of its two Dillons Sunflower Showdown games on Sunday, as the Wildcats travel to Lawrence to face Kansas at 2 p.m. on ESPN+.
