Aggies drop overtime battle at K-State, 71-69

Post-game thoughts

* The Aggies continue to have a tough time playing in Manhattan. It's a very tough place to win because of two factors: K-State has a great atmosphere and it's a community that strongly supports women's basketball. And, simply put, they have really good players. And tonight, the Wildcats' best players were at the top of their game. Brittany Chambers let the way by playing every minute and scoring a game-high 21 points. She found a way to get it done despite not shooting it very well from outside (2-of-9 from three-point range). The story, however, was point guard Mariah White. She posted 12 points and 11 assists to go along with five rebounds and three steals. Even more impressive was that White turned the ball over just two times in 36 minutes against A&M's pressure defense. She was the best player on the floor in this one.

* It's not quite as eye-popping as the men's struggles, but the A&M women are not playing very consistent basketball. Just look at the individuals. You never really know where the production is going to come from in a given game. Tyra White is playing much, much better over the past few weeks, but practically everyone else has been wildly inconsistent this season.

Tonight, Kelsey Bone was very good (14 points, 10 rebounds, 7-of-10 FG) but she fails to show up as often as she puts together a great game. It's all part of K-Bone's development and improvement in conditioning and defensive play, and to her credit, she was very good tonight.

The key player that failed to come to play in this game was junior point guard Adrienne Pratcher. "A-Game" managed just 1 point and 1 assist in 18 minutes and committed 3 turnovers. It's Big 12 play now and while Pratcher has been very good for the most part this season, now is when it really counts and she has to bring her "A-Game" in this league if A&M has any chance to compete for a conference title.

* Sydney Carter is so gutsy. She's battled some nagging injuries but played nearly the entire game, and played very well for the maroon and white. Carter hasn't shot the ball well this season and needs to find her stroke as the Aggies move deeper into Big 12 play, but you won't find many athletes out there with the guts and grit of Syd Carter. I would take a whole team of 5-6 Carters and take my chances any day. She's a monster.

* A&M had K-State right where it wanted the 'Cats, holding a nine-point lead at the break. But what happened at Purdue last month happened again tonight ... A&M stopped scoring and allowed that to affect its defense. The 'Cats went on a 14-4 run early in the second half that tied the game at 43-43. From that point, it was a battle to the end and the two teams needed another five minutes to settle the score. In the extra period, Kansas State was just a touch better and nipped the defending national champs by two points.

* The Ags return home to face Oklahoma on Sunday. The Sooners are having a very good year but the game is at Reed Arena at 2 p.m. and A&M is looking to have a great Sunday afternoon atmosphere to make things difficult on Sherri Coale's group. Hopefully Sunday will be the day that Texas A&M "finds" itself for the first time in a month and starts playing the brand of basketball that allowed the Aggies to make a run last season and shock the college hoops world by taking home the grand prize. They are not that team right now, but things can change quickly. When you're as talented as this group is, all it takes sometimes is one great game to put it all back together.

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Post-game notes

* For the ninth time this season, Texas A&M used the starting lineup of Adrienne Pratcher, Sydney Carter, Tyra White, Adaora Elonu and Kelsey Bone … It marked the 10th start of Bone’s Aggie career, the 13th career start for Pratcher, 83rd for White and 86th for Elonu.

* Texas A&M moves to 6-10 all-time in Big 12 Conference openers and 4-6 when starting league play on the road.

* Texas A&M is now to 7-13 in the all-time series with Kansas State and moves to 0-3 vs. K-State in Big 12 openers.

* The Aggies played their first overtime game since Dec. 20, 2007 at No. 22 George Washington and are now to 13-10 all-time in overtime games.

* A&M outscored K-State 22-7 in second chance points and held a 24-11 advantage in offensive rebounds.

* The Aggie bench outscored the Wildcats’ bench, 13-3.

* Bone tallied her 12th career and third double-double as an Aggie. It was also her second straight.

* White has now started in 70 straight games, a streak that started on Jan. 4, 2010 against Lamar. She has also scored double figures in 19 of her last 20 games.

* In just six minutes in the first half, Gilbert tallied 4 points, four rebounds and a block.

* Elonu dished out a season-high three assists and grabbed a first-half season-high seven rebounds.

* Carter had a first-half season-high four rebounds.

* Skylar Collins played a career-high 23 minutes and contributed 9 points on 4-of-4 from the floor and 1-of-1 from the free throw line, with two assists and two rebounds.

* Adaora Elonu added 8 points and nine rebounds.

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Post-game quotes

HC Gary Blair

Opening statement…

"This team has been playing like this for a long time. Everyone’s circle on their calendar is when they play us. We have to respond. Getting to the Final Four, getting to the NCAA Tournament is not very much in our reach right now until we learn to play better and smarter. The smarter team won tonight. The team that executed their offense in the last five minutes of the game won tonight. We gave up 60 percent in the second half. We have to get better. I had four seniors on the floor. I’m frustrated as a coach and I have to teach better. Drills aren’t going to get us better. Film, basketball IQ and finding a heartbeat as a team is going to get us better."

On K-State’s Mariah White…

"Mariah White played very well. She’s not a jump shooter, she’s a driver, driver, driver and when everything was taken away she put the ball on the floor. We allowed her to get side-by-side and the kid just made a play (at the end). It wasn’t Chambers that beat us, it was White. Carter did an adequate job (on Chambers) for the game."


G Sydney Carter

On guarding Brittany Chambers…

"I’ve got to make sure I’m not taking any plays off. I know she’s going to be involved in every play, either she’s going to be a screen or she’s going to be the shooter. I let her get away from me on a couple of flair screens and she just knocked them down. I think I was doing a pretty good job in the first half. I was wearing her down a bit and she was running off screens and rushing shots off the dribble. In the second half, they were running more flair screens for her and she was knocking them down."

On K-State’s run to start the second half…

"I think that’s where we kind of lost the game. We couldn’t seem to capitalize and we just turned the ball over way too much. Me being a senior out there, I can tell that this team is just way different than last year. We don’t have a point guard and I’m kind of having to run the point. We definitely need our point guards in there running the show and Tyra and I need to knock down some shots. Their run was something careless on our part. We need to do a better job and clean it up."