Box Score (Rolla, Mo.) – The Missouri S&T Lady Miners couldn't overcome a slow start in its 90-71 loss to the 15^th ranked Lewis Flyers on Thursday night in Rolla. The Flyers (19-3, 13-1 GLVC) finished with four players in double figures led by Jess Reinhart with 25.

S&T (8-14, 4-10) made just 4 of its first 23 attempts from the floor and were held to nine points for the first 13-plus minutes; meanwhile Lewis opened the contest red hot with a 15-2 run and was 7-for-10 from the floor. Erica Askew (Chicago, Ill./Morgan Park) pulled the Lady Miners to within 19-8 on a layup at the 11:19 mark which would be the closest S&T got the rest of the stanza.

The Flyers proceeded to score the next 17 points to build a 36-9 lead with 6:26 left in the half. The lead eventually grew to 29 points before the Lady Miners got their offense going by knocking down 5 of their final eight shots to pull within 21 points at the intermission.

S&T had no answer for Kristin Itschner, Mariyah Brawner-Henley and Reinhart in the first half. The trio scored 39 of Lewis's 49 points and was 16-of-23 from the field while the rest of the team went 4-for-9. The Flyers outrebounded the Lady Miners by a 27-to-8 margin and outscored them by 20 points in the paint.

S&T was led in scoring by Senait McLeod (Miami, Fla./Coral Reef) with eight points while Elsie Greenwood (Breckenridge, Mo./Penney High School) dropped home six. The Lady Miners shot 29 percent (9-for-31) from the floor, 3-of-9 from three and 7-for-9 at the charity stripe. They turned it over just four times in the stanza.

S&T started the second half strong scoring the first five points to trim the lead to 16 less than a minute in. Lewis stretched the lead back to 20, but the Lady Miners continued to battle and eventually cut the lead 10 after a three-pointer by McLeod with 8:21 to play.

That would be the closest they got though as the Flyers answered scoring 11 of the next 13 points to stretch the lead back out to 19 just three minutes later.

S&T outscored the Flyers 43-to-41 in the second half and shot 50 percent (17-for-34) from the field but the early hole was too much to dig out of. Karli Sample (St. Joseph, Mo./Benton) scored 12 points in the second half while McLeod added 10.

The Lady Miners finished the game going 26-for-65 (40 percent) from the field, connected on 35 percent (7-of-20) from beyond the arc but went just 12-for-18 at the foul line. McLeod had a game-high 18 points for S&T while Sample added 12. Askew dropped home nine while Elsie Greenwood (Breckenridge, Mo./Penney High School), Toni Knar (Mundelein, Ill./Mundelein) and Jaaron Kassanavoid (Lawson, Mo./Lawson) had eight points each. S&T finished with nine turnovers for the second straight game.

Lewis shot 57.1 percent (32-of-56) from the floor, was 3-for-9 from three and 23-of-30 at the foul line. The Flyers won the battle of the glass 44-to-22 and outscored S&T 44-27 in the paint.

The Lady Miners are back at home on Saturday to take on Wisconsin-Parkside at 1 p.m. The Rangers lost at ninth ranked Drury 77-56 on Thursday.