Women fall short in SMU upset bid

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by Alex Chapman

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The women's basketball team appeared to be two different teams this week.

The team that played the University of Houston Saturday night was composed, aggresive and functioned as a single unit. The result was a 70-57 win.

Wednesday night, Southern Methodist University played a team that was disorganized and lacking in offensive intensity. The result was a 61-60 SMU victory.

Wednesday night's game at Autry Court against SMU was a seesaw affair, with 10 lead changes and eight ties. But the advantage was unquestionably Rice.

The Owls maintained a small lead for the majority of the first half, but they were unable to put together a cohesive run to break the game open. Thirteen first-half turnovers led to a 25-25 halftime tie.

The second half started in much the same way as the first, with Rice either ahead or tied with the Mustangs.

But guard Nater Dunn, playing with four fouls, made three jump shots to put the Mustangs up 50-46 with 5:54 remaining in the game.

Then Kim Brandl entered the game. Her tangible intensity raised the entire SMU team a notch.

"The difference was Kim Brandl. She had the mentality to take over a basketball game. She decided she wanted to win, and she did what she had to. We don't have a player like that right now," Rice Head Coach Cristy McKinney said.

Before the Owls woke from their sleepwalk, they found themselves down five with 1:09 remaining in the game. The Owls tried to come back, but the Mustangs made their free throws and were able to escape with the victory.

Rice's Tammy McCallum made a three-point shot with less than a second remaining, and the Owls were not able to call a time-out before the buzzer sounded.

Brandl had 25 points to lead the Mustangs to their 16th victory of the year against seven losses. The Mustangs improved to 16-7 overall and 6-3 within the Southwest Conference. Kim Brungardt had seven points and 11 rebounds for SMU.

McCallum's ability to create her own shots was one of the few bright spots. She finished with 19 points and 10 rebounds for the Owls.

McKinney was unhappy with her team's inability to take advantage of their chance to defeat a team that was favored to win the Southwest Conference in the preseason. "We played bad tonight, as bad as we have in a long time," she said.

Her players were also taking a hard look at their play in the wake of their defeat. "What do we need to do to win these games? That's a good question," she said. "The coach was asking us that after the game."

The superficial difficulties were apparent to all, however. The Owls only shot 36 percent of the floor.

"Our biggest problem was offensive intensity. Our defense was OK, but we couldn't score," McCallum said.

Against Houston on Saturday afternoon in a nationally televised game, however, it was a different story. The Owls defeated Houston using sharp passing (as evidenced by 17 assists) and an aggresively collapsing defense.

Using point guard Kim LaLonde as Pat Luckey's shadow, the Owls were able to hold Luckey, the conference's leading scorer, to 16 points on five of 17 shooting.

The Owls pulled down more rebounds, committed fewer turnovers and made more of their shots than the Cougars. McCallum had 17 points and nine rebounds, Cafagna had 14 points and a career-high 10 rebounds, Stephanie Mundschau contributed 12 points and Hamilton added 10 points.

The Owls have a record of 11-11, 4-6 in the SWC. The Owls will be on the road this week to face Texas A&M University on Saturday and Texas Christian University on Wednesday before returning home for the final games of the season.

This item appeared in the Sports section of the February 16, 1996 issue.

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