COLUMBIA, Mo. – In basketball, the fight for a regular season league title can often come down to wins away from home. Missouri Baptist women's basketball showed true grit in finding one of those wins on Thursday night with an overtime victory at Silverthorne Arena against previous third place Stephens College.
 
Missouri Baptist (9-3, 5-1 in AMC) did not have its best showing against the Stephens Stars (9-3, 4-2 in AMC). The Spartans found themselves clawing their way back on a couple of occasions, but did just enough to take things past regulation and proceeded to dominate OT for a 79-70 come from behind win.
 
Graduate senior Kasey Rice would play hero in the closing seconds. Following a clutch 3-pointer from Tionne Taylor to get within a score, the game would hang in the balance at the charity stripe. With a chance to seal it ahead 67-65, the Stars went one-of-two from the free throw line. Senior Lauren Ebert grabbed the rebound off the missed shot, brought the ball up the floor, and found Rice in the corner. The Tabor College transfer drained the tying basket with 11 seconds on the clock, her first points of the night, to send the visiting bench into a frenzy.
 
Rice would get one last look before the fourth quarter buzzer that clanked off the front of the rim, but the Spartans had done enough to fight back from a six-point deficit with under a minute left to tie the contest. MBU scored the first nine points of the added period and all but wrap a game they looked down and out of just three minutes of game time earlier.
 
Rice, starting for the second time in as many games, would finish with six points and managed four rebounds and a block to boot.
 
Leading up to the final minute of drama, MoBap led the whole first quarter and looked poised to control the game from the opening minutes. Stephens fought back and turned a three-point MBU lead into a nine-point advantage at the break courtesy of a 19-6 run and 14 first half points from Zaraya March.
 
The Spartans turned things around in the third and got things level, 45-45, before the final 10 minutes. The Stars looked like they would break away on a couple of occasions late, leading by as much as eight two times in the final five minutes. MBU stayed the course, getting timely baskets from posts J'lessa Jordan, Alexis Allstun, and Kelsie Williams to set up the late rally.
 
Taylor was the leading scorer for MoBap with 23 points. It was the senior's ninth game bearing the point leader torch for the Spartans this season, who had a season high in assists with six as well. Allstun logged 10 points and had five rebounds, while Williams managed a healthy eight-point, eight-rebound night off the bench.
 
MBU had periods of sloppy play that gave the Stars momentum. The Spartans lost the ball 23 times and only hit 11 of their 23 free throws (47.8 percent). The visitors made up for it by shooting at a 30-for-52 mark (57.7 percent) from the field and an 8-for-18 clip (44.4 percent) from beyond the arc, which was the Spartans' second-best showing of the season from 3. MBU's depth also displayed itself, with 29 points from the bench.
 
"Big time game," head coach Sam Pearson said. "Stephens is a well-coached group that plays hard, guards hard, and is tough-minded. This was a gritty win for us. We could have given up late, but we kept our composure and pulled it off. J'lessa Jordan changed the game with her athleticism and activity, and Kasey Rice with the biggest shot of the season was huge. It's tough to win on the road in this conference, [so] I'm proud of our team's resilience."
 
Other notable performances for MBU came by way of J'lessa Jordan (8 points, 3 rebounds), Deyana Dodd (6 points, 3 steals, 2 rebounds, 2 assists), Bryce Dowell (7 points), and Kayleigh Winch (6 points),
 
Missouri Baptist have put themselves in the thick of the conference race, but must now go against first-place University of Health Sciences & Pharmacy on Saturday, Jan. 7th at 1:00 pm with a shot at claiming a share of the lead in the AMC standings.