Joplin, Mo. - The Southwest Baptist University women's basketball team's comeback effort came up just short against Missouri Southern on Thursday evening, dropping the game to the Lions 69-63.

The Bearcats played tight with Missouri Southern to begin the contest, but found themselves down 8-18 nearing halfway through the first half. SBU responded with a 12-2 run, fueled by seven points from Brittney Dukes, to pull even at 20-20 with 8:32 to go in the half. However the Bearcats trailed the Lions 27-37 going into the break.

Coming out of half the Bearcats would cut the lead back to seven off of a Chasity Prince three-pointer, but Missouri Southern pushed their lead to 13 at 30-43. The Bearcats continued to fight, slowly cutting into the lead over the final eight minutes of the contest. The Bearcats pulled within four at 53-57 (4:04) off of a couple of free throws from Prince, but were unable to draw any closer as SBU lost the contest 63-69.

Chasity Prince led the way for the Bearcats with 19 points off of 7-15 shooting from the field, while Brittney Dukes gave SBU 18 points and 5 boards. Jacqui Zelenka was the only other Bearcat in double figures with 13 points and 6 rebounds. As a team SBU shot 34.3% from the field (23-67), 20.8% from beyond the arc (5-24), and 92.3% from the free throw line (12-13). The Bearcats out-rebounded the Lions 38-29 and forced 19 turnovers in the loss.

SBU will be back in action on Saturday, February 9 when they travel to Pittsburg, Kansas to take on Pittsburg State. Tip-off is set for 1:30 p.m.