The Saint Louis University women's basketball team started off the month of December this Wednesday by facing off against Southwest Missouri State. The Bills intensity picked up in the second half but was unable to stop the Lady Bears and ended the game down by 30, 86-56.

"We have a lot of young players, and we try to prepare them for each opponent. It's hard for them to adjust game to game," coach Jill Pizzotti said. "We just need to defend people better and guard in the half court. We need to just keep working hard."

The beginning of the game started out close, but after tying 4-4, and then SMS going up 7-4, the Bills were unable to gain the lead or even come close again.

"We started well, but we made mistakes that led to them making baskets and those start to add up after a while," Rachel Diener said.

With just under 10 minutes remaining on the clock, the Lady Bears went on a 6-0 run to pull ahead 20-12. The Bills tried to answer back with a basket by Marquita McFarland, but the Lady Bulldogs went on a 17-0 run to pull ahead even more, 37-14 with 3:31 left in the half.

McFarland was finally able to break the streak by sinking two foul shots with 2:42 left in the half. SMS got the points back 15 seconds later when Nicole Lehman sank two free-throws of her own.

Nine seconds later SMS was able to add to their lead by sinking two more free-throw putting the Lady Bears up by 25 with the score, 41-16, with just over two minutes left to play in the half.

With 1:20 left in the half, Heather King scored a basket after a pass inside.

SMS scored two more baskets, and the Bills tried to answer with McFarland, but she missed her two free throws with 1.6 seconds left. SMS tried for one last shot, but the inbound pass was stolen by Diener to take the Bills into the locker room.

"They got more defensive rebounds than us, but that's going to happen when we keep missing shots," Pizzotti said.

"We needed to attack the glass more and have better transition defense."

The second half started out better for the Bills with McFarland going strong to the basket scoring two plus drawing the foul. She missed the extra point, but a quick steal by Mia Johnson resulted in two more for the Bills.

"We tried not to hang our heads after the first half," Diener said. "We had the whole second half ahead of us and we wanted to work on cutting their lead."

SMS was able to end the Bills short run by sinking two foul shots, keeping the lead strong, 47-22.

The Bills sank four three pointers in a row, but they could not get a stop on defense, and with 11:52 left were still down 57-36.

The Bills continued to make plays but for every shot the Bills had, SMS was able to return.

And with just over five minutes left in the game the Bills were still down by 26, 70-44. The Bills were not able to overcome the deficit from the first half and after a good effort in the second half still lost to the Lady Bears, 86-56.

"We just need to keep improving on both ends of the court," Diener said.

"In practice tomorrow we will work on defense and try to keep improving."

In the first half the Bills only shot 24.1 percent, while SMS shot 60 percent and no Billikens were in double digits.

SLU made only one three-pointer in the half to SMS's five. SMS made all of their free throws while SLU only shot 50 percent.

In the second half, the Bills shot better with 40 percent while SMS shot 56 percent.

McFarland was the only Billiken player to score in double-digits with 14 points.

While most of us were busy eating leftover turkey, the women's basketball team was busy hosting the Coca Cola Billiken Classic last weekend. The Bills lost their first game, 48-44, to Alabama A&M, but came back the next day to come in third, beating Austin Peay, 76-65, in the consolation game.

The beginning of Friday night's game against Alabama A&M did not start out well for either team, with the teams missing 43 shots of 53 shots attempted. The score at the end of the first half had Alabama A&M up 17-13.

The next half went better for both teams. SLU took an early 29-27 lead until the Lady Bulldogs went on a 14-1 run that was broken when Diener, sank a three pointer.

The Bills were trailing by 10, but were able to come back to within three, 43-40.

"We came back, and finally turned our game around, but time wasn't on our side," Johnson said. "We didn't come mentally prepared for the game. We were forcing our shots and not sticking to our game plan."

Marquita McFarland, for the Bills was able to sink four free throws to pull within one, but Alabama A&M's Tamisha Augustin sank two free-throws with 6.5 seconds remaining to end the game.

The Bills did better in the consolation game, earning their first win of the regular season.

"It felt great to win, we really needed that," Johnson said. "We felt relieved to win and are glad we are showing signs of improvement."

Johnson dropped in 31 points for the Bills to help them win 76-65, against Austin Peay to win third place.

Johnson set a school scoring record for a freshman and recorded only the fifth 30-point game in the Billiken's history.

The teams this night came out ready to play, with Austin Peay scoring their first six out of six shots and the Bills made their first five out of six.

The Bills took a 36-30 lead at the half, and in the second half Johnson had four three-pointers to keep the Bills on top.

The Lady Governors were unable to come back from their deficit.

SLU won, 76-65. Johnson had 31, points while Marquita McFarland had 13.