by Steven Fernandez
Daily Lobo
Brandi Kimble drove to the basket, got the shot she wanted and watched it roll off the rim.
That was in the final seconds as the UNM women's basketball team lost a 49-48 heartbreaker to Utah on Sunday at The Pit.
The Lobos dropped to 10-5 overall and 0-2 in the Mountain West Conference. UNM also lost its first conference home game in 36 games.
Get content from The Daily Lobo delivered to your inbox
Unfortunately for the Lobos, Kimble's shot wasn't the only one that didn't connect in the second half.
After scoring 34 points on 56 percent shooting in the first half, the UNM offense was almost nowhere to be found after the intermission.
The Lobos managed 14 points in the second half and only made four of their 28 second-half field goal attempts.
UNM head coach Don Flanagan said he was disgusted with the Lobos' performance late in the game.
"Shooting in the second half was horrendous," he said. "Absolutely the worst I've ever seen. I think I could hit four out of 28 with my eyes closed."
UNM held a 34-30 lead after the first half, before Dionne Marsh and Julie Briody hit 3-pointers to extend the advantage to 40-30 in the opening minutes of the second half.
However, the Lobos struggled to put together any kind of offense the rest of the game. UNM took 10 3-point shots in the second half and only made two - the ones by Marsh and Briody to open the half.
Flanagan said nothing positive came from the loss.
"I don't have anything to compliment, except for (Utah's) play," he said. "They played with poise. They hit the open shots, and they played to win the game, and I didn't think that we did."
As bad as UNM played in the second half, Utah didn't take the lead until the final five minutes of the game and never led by more than one point.
With eight seconds left and the Lobos trailing 49-48, Kimble drove past the Utah defenders and put a layup off the backboard, which rolled off the rim. The ball bounced around several players' hands, before the buzzer sounded to end the game.
Flanagan said he was happy with the final play but frustrated it wasn't successful.
"She got the drive that she wanted," he said. "I'm happy she had the courage to take the drive. But you just got to finish those things to win games."
The offense was running fine, it was just a matter of making shots, Kimble said.
"We got a lot of good shots. We just didn't knock them down," she said. "We just have to work on our confidence level."
Flanagan said the team has to play with more poise.
"It has to be mental," he said. "That's what I have to work on. I got to go back and really work hard mentally on this team. They got to toughen up, and I'm going to toughen them up."
Briody said the Lobos need to step up as a team if they are going to make a run in the MWC.
"We're a good team. We're just not showing it right now," Briody said. "People aren't showing up, and we need them to show up a lot better if we're going to contend for a title."
