KATY, Texas — For the first five minutes, it was hard to figure out which team on the floor was the defending conference champion.

In the next 35, it became considerably clearer.

No. 2 seed McNeese State overcame a sluggish start to down No. 7 Southeastern Louisiana 67-55 in the first round of the Southland Conference women’s basketball tournament on Tuesday afternoon.

The Cowgirls (24-7) will play No. 6 Texas State (17-14), which upset No. 3 Sam Houston State 74-66, in the semifinals at noon Thursday.

“We got off to a really rocky start,” said McNeese coach Brooks Donald Williams. “We did a better job of composing ourselves in the second half and did a much better job of attacking and playing our basketball.”

The Lions (12-18) jumped out to a 16-2 lead in a heartbeat behind eight early points from Kelli Jenkins. SLU also forced McNeese into eight first-half turnovers with its full-court defense.

“We hit shots early on, and I think after that we got a little comfortable with taking our first-shot opportunities and didn’t play an extra pass or two deeper (into the possession),” said SLU coach Lori Davis Jones. “Then we didn’t got get any second shots. We were one-and-done.”

However, SLU was unable to sustain the lead. The Cowgirls took their first lead at 27-25 on a Candace LaCombe 3-pointer with 1:35 left in the first half and never looked back.

“We came out holding the ball over our head, not attacking and taking advantage of our strengths,” Donald Williams said. “The second half, I thought we did. We talked about that at halftime, and no question about defense. We felt we had a lot more to give in the second half.”

In the long run, SLU was unable to compete with McNeese along with glass. The Cowgirls outrebounded the Lions 53-35.

“They just work really hard on the boards,” Jones said. “They are a little longer than us (inside) and they just go after it hard. They’ve beaten us there all three times this year.”

Most of the damage was done by senior forward Kendra Wells, who hauled in a career-high 21 rebounds to go with nine points.

“I go into every game thinking my role is to rebound,” Wells said. “That’s what I take pride in.”

Adrienne Minor also came off the bench to grab 10 rebounds in 21 minutes with starter Martika Hull mired in foul trouble.

McNeese’s offense broke out of its early funk thanks to sisters Ashlyn and Caitlyn Baggett finding their way to the rim. Ashlyn scored a game-high 19 and Caitlyn added 18. Half of Caitlyn’s points came at the free-throw line.

(AMERICAN PRESS)

Karen Wink