Wildcats Hang Tough with No. 10 MNU, Fall at Home, 88-70

BALDWIN CITY - Baker women's basketball pushed No. 10 MidAmerica Nazarene to the brink, but fell short in its upset bid as the Pioneers came out on top, 88-70 here Thursday night in the Collins Center.

The Wildcats trailed by six points with a minute left in the third quarter before the Pioneers, who clinched the conference regular-season championship outright tonight, started to put the game away in the fourth quarter and snap BU's four-game home winning streak.

BU had one of its best offensive nights of the season, shooting over 50 percent from the floor (51%) for the second time this season and matching its season-high with nine 3-pointers.

One of the key discrepancies in the game came from the foul line where MNU was awarded over three times as many trips as BU with the Pioneers going 16-for-27, while Baker went 7-for-8.

Sophia Barrett notched her third straight 20-point game, finishing with a game-high 25 points, four assists and two blocks. Destiny Kiner and Taniya Tease both hit a couple of threes and finished in double figures with Kiner tallying 13 points and Tease following right behind with 12.

Baker started off the night by firing at a blistering rate from three-point range, going 5-for-7 from deep initially with Kiner and Tease kickstarting the barrage with back-to-back triples to open the game.

After a quick 8-3 lead for BU, the Pioneers punched back with a string of layups on over-the-top passes to the post and outscored the Wildcats, 19-5 for the remainder of the first quarter to take a 22-13 lead.

The second period began exactly as the first with Baker knocking down its first two shots from three, this time coming from Barrett and Maggie Myers. Layups by Kiner and Hannah Motsinger pulled the 'Cats within three at 26-23 before MNU worked its lead back out to double digits later on in the quarter

Tease connected on another trey and found Barrett on a nice cut to the rim to trim BU's deficit to seven points with two minutes left in the half. With the Pioneers making only two 3-pointers in the first half, the latter one came with a minute left and was followed up by a last-second layup to give the visitors a 46-34 halftime lead.

In the second half, MNU built the advantage all the way to a 15-point margin before Barrett responded with seven unanswered points, including a three-point play to inch BU closer. Alyssa Morris followed with a layup to cut it to a 10-point game.

With MNU leading by 12, Kiner and Myers knocked down another set of threes for BU to make the score 63-57 with a minute left in the third quarter. The Pioneers were able to mount the final surge in the frame though, using a three-point play in the waning seconds to take a double-digit lead into the fourth quarter.

Kiner converted a three-point play of her own to start the fourth and hit a jumper in the lane a little bit later to get the Wildcats within 11 points at 75-64. A layup from Barrett made it a 10-point game going into the final five minutes of play.

A devastating three from MNU squashed any hopes of a late-game rally for BU as the Pioneers padded their lead and finished things off with the final score settling at a deceiving 88-70 in their favor.

With five of their six wins coming in 2025, the Wildcats saw their four-game home winning streak come to an end, which featured back-to-back victories last week in Collins with a double-digit win over Central Methodist on Feb. 8, followed by a 76-70 come-from-behind win against Mount Mercy on Saturday.

Up next, Baker will head to its final road game of the regular season with a matchup at Graceland on Saturday, February 15 at 2 p.m. in Lamoni, Iowa.

#BakerBuildsChampions