Montana
Montana Western
Cole leads Lady Griz to 67-46 exhibition win
11/7/2013 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Nov. 7, 2013
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Redshirt junior Kellie Cole scored a game-high 22 points to lead Montana to a 67-46 victory over Montana Western Thursday night at Dahlberg Arena in the Lady Griz' second and final exhibition game.
Montana, which beat MSU Billings 69-65 last week in its first exhibition game, opens its regular season Sunday against MSU Northern. The Lady Griz and Skylights tip off at 2 p.m. at Dahlberg Arena.
Montana and Montana Western were tied 17-17 with six and a half minutes left in the first half when the Lady Griz started the game's decisive run.
Freshman Kayleigh Valley hit a three from the left wing, Cole added a triple and a jumper and Montana went 9 for 13 over the final 6:26 to close the first half on a 22-2 tear and take a 39-19 lead to the locker room.
The teams combined to shoot 25.4 percent in a disjointed second half and commit 24 fouls. Fifteen of those were whistled on Montana, which sent Montana Western to the line 21 times in the second half, 27 for the game.
The lead remained between 15 and 25 points the entire second half, with the Bulldogs' 25.0 percent shooting not good enough to close the gap and the Lady Griz' 25.6 percent not good enough to further pull away.
"This was a little more ragged than our first exhibition game, but that was maybe to be expected," UM coach Robin Selvig said. "The second half didn't have much flow to it. There were a lot of fouls and a lot of missed shots.
"They are scrappy and do some nice things, but we had too many fouls, particularly in the second half. That put them on the line a bunch, which you shouldn't be doing with a lead."
It's only two exhibition games, but Cole, whose regular-season career high is 16 points, has been an offensive dynamo in the preseason. She averaged 18.5 points in the two exhibition games on 70 percent shooting.
"Kellie is just playing really well," Selvig said. "She's seems confident, and she's under control, and of course her shot is going down for her. And I like how she's playing on the defensive end of the floor too.
"She's such a good weapon, because she can score around the basket as well as shoot it on the perimeter. I couldn't be happier with how she's playing."
Outside of Cole's 9-for-13 shooting night, the rest of the Lady Griz struggled on the offensive end. Nobody else scored more than seven points, and minus Cole's numbers the team shot 27.4 percent.
Valley finished with seven points. Senior Jordan Sullivan and freshman Alycia Sims both added six.
"You always feel a little frustrated about a game when you don't shoot it well, and we certainly didn't tonight," Selvig said. "There are just a lot of things to work on."
Montana got out-rebounded by nine when the Lady Griz defeated MSU Billings last week. The boards were not an issue Thursday against the undersized Bulldogs.
Montana grabbed 56 rebounds to Montana Western's 34. Redshirt junior Carly Selvig snagged 11, Sullivan 10. Twenty-six of UM's rebounds came on the offensive end, and the Lady Griz converted those into 27 second-chance points.
Sammi Bignell, the Frontier Conference preseason player of the year, led Western with 16 points on 8-of-16 shooting.
