Head coach Zenarae Antoine told Toshua Leavitt the truth.
The senior guard obliterated the Georgia State defense, scoring a career-high 35 points in a 69-60 road win on Jan. 5. Most of Leavitt’s points came from behind the arc, as she hit a season-high nine 3-pointers on 14 attempts.
“It’s never going to be that easy again,” Antoine told Leavitt after the game.
The head coach was right. The maroon and gold’s leading scorer picked up just two points on Thursday as Texas State fell inside Strahan Arena, 57-34, in a rematch against the Panthers.
The visitors kept a defender magnetized to Leavitt throughout the whole game. Georgia State hedged and switched on every screen the Bobcats ran her through. The senior only took five shots on the night, most of them contested, and made just one of them — a layup in transition to give the hosts a 12-6 lead in the first quarter. The team scored just two points the rest of the half.
The Panthers employed the same strategy on junior guard Brooke Holle, who had a similarly rough shooting night, making 4-16 field goals for 10 points. Leavitt and Holle combined for five turnovers.
“One of the things we’ve talked a fair amount about as a staff at times is what happens in those games where Toshua has a difficult time getting going or she has a difficult time getting looks because her and Brooke dominate so much, obviously, of our scoring,” Antoine said. “We’ve talked about who could step it up for us ...When that happened for some of our kids, they took those opportunities and they missed them. So they tightened up even more.”
On one possession in the second quarter, the Bobcats found Holle wide open in the left corner. The junior unleashed a trey that hit all rim. Senior forward Zandra Emanuel came up with the offensive rebound and sprung back up for a putback, but the ball still refused to fall in. Georgia State grabbed the defensive board and hit a trey on the other end to go ahead, 27-14, with four minutes left in the first half.
Emanuel, who led the Sun Belt entering the game with a 51.8 field goal percentage, sank just two of her five attempts.
“The tough part that we struggled with is finding that open big. And the times that we did, the big struggled hitting that midrange shot or making the extra pass,” Antoine said. “Well, what happens from that? Turnovers, bad shot selection. (It) put a lot of pressure on our defense.”
For the first time this year, Texas State failed to make a shot from deep, missing all 10 of its tries. The result was the team’s worst offensive outing of the season, shooting just 27.8 percent from the floor and falling to the Panthers, 57-34. Holle’s 10 points led the team, followed by sophomore forward Jayla Johnson and freshman guard Kennedy Taylor with six apiece.
Antoine wasn’t happy with the loss. But she knew her players weren’t either and was positive the Bobcats would be able to move past it.
“This game was really ugly from our end, for sure,” Antoine said. “I really am confident with this group, from everything I’ve seen and know about them, they’re not happy with this. They’re going to bounce back from it.”
Texas State (9-10, 4-3 Sun Belt) will host Georgia Southern (5-13, 0-7) on Saturday inside Strahan Arena at 2 p.m.
