Second half collapse dooms SIC women

</element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[Everything the Southeastern Illinois College women's basketball team built through the first 30 minutes of its game against Rend Lake College was lost over the final 10 minutes.

SIC held a 49-31 lead with 10 minutes to go in the game, but host Rend Lake stormed back to pick up a 57-56 nailbiter of a win.

Head coach Rod Wallace said the team struggled to take control of the late-game situations.

"There were a lot of things that went into the loss, but in particular, we made ourselves vulnerable to the pressure," Wallace said.

After committing four turnovers in the first half, the Lady Falcons had 10 giveaways, including several crucial errors over the last 10 minutes. Tonia Evans led the Lady Falcons with 18 points and 12 rebounds. Dameika Mitchell posted a double-double of her own with 11 points and 10 boards.

Courtney Smith added 14 points as well.

Wallace said he had yet to see someone step up and call for the ball in late-game, crunch-time scenarios and said "it ought to be either Kelsey Bradford or Mitchell."

The SIC head coach said the team would work on it's game management in practice before it ends its road trip with a game at Wabash on Saturday.

"I think we're going to have to work on some things with practice on how to finish under pressure," Wallace said. "We put ourselves in that position and made some turnovers."