Gophers women go into deep freeze, lose to Purdue

With the Gophers women's basketball team trailing Purdue 52-50 with 3 minutes, 2 seconds remaining, senior forward Kristen Dockery went up for a wide-open layup.

The point-blank shot could've tied a back-and-forth game but was instead just one in a series of miscues for the Gophers -- they went the final 8:35 without a basket -- in a 60-50 loss to Purdue on Thursday night at Williams Arena.

"We didn't play well," coach Pam Borton said of a Gophers team that has lost three in a row while desperately trying to build momentum for the Big Ten tournament.

The Gophers (11-15, 3-10 Big Ten) shot 7-for-32 (21.9 percent) and missed their final 11 shots in the second half. Overall, they shot 28.6 percent, tying a season low, and went 0-for-9 from behind the three-point arc.

Junior forward Brianna Mastey led the Gophers with a career-high 17 points off the bench on 6-for-8 shooting, but she was the only Minnesota player to score in double figures.

"I just kind of kept attacking, and once I hit a few shots, I just kind of kept feeling it throughout the whole game," said Mastey, who has come off the bench for the past five games after starting the first 19.

After getting into early foul trouble, leading scorer Kiara Buford never could find a rhythm, scoring only eight points on 2-for-16 shooting. Senior point guard China Antoine had zero points on 0-for-8 shooting in 38 minutes.

Jackie Voigt finished with eight points and 11 rebounds, but Gophers starters combined for just half of the team's points.

Purdue junior guard Rayburn scored 17 of her game-high 27 points in the second half and went 12-for-14 from the free-throw line. Junior forward Drey Mingo had 10 points and 12 rebounds.

Rayburn hit a three-pointer with 5:35 remaining to give the Boilermakers (18-9, 8-6) the lead for good, 50-48. They made eight of nine free throws during the final 4:07 to ice the game.

After trailing 31-30 at halftime, the Gophers took a 34-33 lead early in the second half. But they could never stretch the advantage to more than one, and Purdue scored the game's final 10 points.