After trailing by as many as 20 points in the first half the Lee women's basketball team saw its comeback effort come up just short in falling to West Florida, 74-69 on Thursday night.
The win sealed the first ever Gulf South Conference regular-season championship for the No. 20 Argonauts as they improved to 22-5 and 17-4. The loss drops Lee into third place in the league at 19-8, 14-7. West Florida entered the week No. 2 and the Lady Flames claimed the No. 5 spot in the NCAA South Region rankings.
Erin Walsh led the way with 18 points on 8 of 18 shooting from the field.
Carrie Cheeks followed with a double-double performance of 16 points and 11 rebounds. Freshman point guard Abby Bertram added 14 points on 7 of 11 shooting while dishing out six assists.
West Florida stormed out to a 20-point advantage with 7:16 remaining in the second period. The Lady Flames would chip away and close the half on a 14-3 run to cut the deficit to 41-32 at the halftime break.
Lee would cut the margin all the way down to one at 54-53 on a layup by Walsh with 8:52 remaining before the Argonauts stretched the lead back out and put things away with late foul shots in the final minute.
"I was happy with the fight we showed after the first 12 minutes but I'm disappointed we could never seem to get over the hump," said head coach Marty Rowe after the contest. "Credit West Florida they made tough plays when needed and we couldn't seem to make those type of plays."
The Lady Flames shot a sizzling 51 percent from the field and canned 6 of 16 3-pointers. Lee struggled from the foul line however hitting just 5 of its 12 attempts.
Katie Bobos led a balanced scoring attack for the Argonauts as she had 15 points and 10 rebounds. Senior Alex Coyne had eight points and handed out nine assists. Toni Brewer followed with 11 markers and eight rebounds and Katie O'Neil rounded out the double-figure scoring with 11 points.
West Florida shot 45.5 percent from the field and was 18 of 28 from the charity stripe. The Argonauts held a 36-32 advantage on the glass. Lee committed 16 turnovers and forced the home team into 12.
In what always seems to be a closely contested battle the two powerhouse programs may just end up seeing each other again in the GSC Tournament. Lee won a double-overtime thriller back on Jan. 9 and defeated West Florida on the road by one-point in the GSC quarterfinal round last season.
The Lady Flames will wrap up the regular season with an all-important visit to Valdosta State on Saturday afternoon at 2 p.m. Lee currently sits one-game back of the Blazers for the second seed in the GSC Tournament which is set to begin on Tuesday.