Kansas State University Athletics
Sunday, November 16
Manhattan, Kan.
1 p.m.
Kansas State University
3-2,0-0Big 12
72
vs
77
Texas A&M
3-0,0-0SEC
1
2
3
4
F
Texas A&M
15
26
21
15
77
Kansas St.
13
15
31
13
72
Photo by: Reece Bachta Photography
Photo by: Reece Bachta Photography
Photo by: Reece Bachta Photography
Photo by: Reece Bachta Photography
Photo by: Reece Bachta Photography
Photo by: Reece Bachta Photography
Photo by: Reece Bachta Photography
Photo by: Reece Bachta Photography
Photo by: Reece Bachta Photography
Photo by: Reece Bachta Photography
Photo by: Reece Bachta Photography
Photo by: Reece Bachta Photography
Second Half Rally Comes Up Shy for K-State
Nov 16, 2025 | Women's Basketball
MANHATTAN, Kansas – K-State used a big third quarter to rally back into Sunday's game against Texas A&M at Bramlage Coliseum, but the Aggies held off the comeback with a 77-72 win over the Wildcats.
K-State (3-2) saw four players reach double figures, led by senior guard Tess Heal with 15 points on 6-of-8 shooting. With her point total on Sunday, Heal surpassed the 1,500-point mark in her collegiate career.
Joining Heal was the freshmen trio of Brandie Harrod, Gina Garcia and Jordan Speiser with 12 points each. Harrod and Speiser each achieved career-highs in scoring and added six rebounds each to their final lines, while Garcia tallied three rebounds and three assists.
Texas A&M (3-0) was paced by Ny'Ceara Pryor with a game-high 24 points on 10-of-15 shooting.Â
HOW IT HAPPENED
- After Texas A&M built a 12-point advantage, 30-18, freshman guard Aniya Foy ended the run for the Aggies with six points and Taryn Sides added a 3-pointer to bring the Wildcats back to within seven, 34-27, with 1:57 left. Foy ended the game with nine points.
- The Aggies would close the half with a 7-1 run to build a 13-point halftime lead, 41-28. Texas A&M would take the second quarter, 26-15, by shooting 73.3 percent (11-of-15) from the field.
- K-State battled back in the third quarter, pulling to within two points on two occasions, as the Wildcats would win the frame, 31-21, and trail 62-59 entering the fourth. The 31 points were a season-high for a third quarter for K-State this season.
- K-State shot 64.7 percent (11-of-17) from the field in the third, as Harrod tallied seven points and Garcia, Heal and Speiser added six apiece.
- Texas A&M would push its lead back to seven, 68-61, on its 10th three-pointer of the afternoon with 6:35 remaining in the fourth quarter.
- K-State used a 7-0 run to tie the game at 68 with 4:05 to play, highlighted by a deep 3-pointer from Speiser.
- Harrod would finish a layup with 2:34 to play in the fourth quarter to tie the game at 70. This was the closest K-State would come to going in front, as the Aggies ended the game with a 7-2 run, highlighted by a Pryor layup with 1:29 left that gave Texas A&M a four-point advantage, 74-70.
- K-State shot 47.3 percent (26-of-55) from the field, including 47.6 percent (10-of-21) from beyond the arc.
- The Wildcats held a 13-2 advantage in second chance points, doing so on eight offensive rebounds.
QUICK FACTS
- K-State leads the series with Texas A&M, 14-10. The Wildcats are 124-147 (.458) against current members of the SEC. The Wildcats are 7-2 in the series with the Aggies in games played in Manhattan.
- K-State head coach Jeff Mittie owns a career record of 675-380 (.640), including a mark of 221-145 (.604).
- K-State is 415-159 (.723) in its 38th-season inside Bramlage Coliseum, including a 145-51 (.740) record under Mittie. The Wildcats are 240-32 (.882) in non-conference games in Bramlage including an 86-11 (.887) mark during Mittie's time with at K-State.
- The Wildcats are 169-57 (.748) in games played in the month of November. Under head coach Jeff Mittie, K-State is 55-14 (.797) in games during the 11th month.Â
TEAM NOTES
- K-State's starting five consisted of guards Gina Garcia, Brandie Harrod, Tess Heal and Taryn Sides and center Ramiya White. This was the first time this lineup has started together this season. This was the 79th career start for Heal and her fifth at K-State. This was the fifth career start for Harrod. This was the fourth career start for Sides. This was the third career start for Garcia. White made her first career start.
- The Wildcats registered one quarter (third) with 20 or more points on Sunday. Since the start of the quarter system in 2015-16, K-State is 162-67 (.707) when scoring 20 or more points in any quarter in a game. K-State has eight quarters this season with 20 or more points scored.
- K-State had the edge in bench scoring, 27-25. The Wildcats have received 20 or more points from its bench in all five games this season.
PLAYER NOTES
- Speiser reached double figures in points for the second time in her career.
- Speiser connected on a career-high four field goals from long range. This was her first career game with two or more conversions from distance.
- Foy made two three-pointers on Sunday. This was her second career game with two or more connections from long range.
- Izela Arenas pulled in a career-high six rebounds on Sunday. This was her first career game with five or more rebounds.
- Garcia recorded her second career game in double digits for points. This was her second straight game in double figures.
- With her 2-of-2 effort from the foul line on Sunday, Garcia has now made 16 consecutive free throws to begin her career.
- Heal tallied a team-high 15 points. With the effort, she surpassed the career 1,500-point mark (1,503). She joins former Wildcat Gabby Gregory as the second player to surpass the career 1,500-mark after transferring to Kansas State.
- Heal owns 76 career games in double figures, including two this season.
- Harrod carded a career-high in points and her second game this season in double figures.
- Harrod owns four games with five or more rebounds.
- Taryn Sides made two or more 3-point field goals in a game for the 35th time in her career.
FROM THE HEAD COACH
K-State Head Coach Jeff Mittie
On the difference in effort in the second half today compared to previously…
"I think it's better. I think there was a lot of growth in this game, but ultimately, we need to make more plays. The goal is to win the game, figure out how to win the game. So we're never going to be happy with the fact that we didn't do that but, if you didn't see progress today, then you weren't watching the same game I was watching. We had a lot of freshmen out there, a lot of young players, and I thought a lot of them did a lot of really, really good things. So I don't want that to go unnoticed. We're disappointed. It hurts when that happens, but I thought we did some good things today."
On the biggest message coming out of halftime…
"An area that we have to improve in is our focus and our attention to detail. And I was not happy at halftime, because there were about three adjustments that we had made prior to the game, and we were having players out on the floor kind of give that look of, I don't understand what you're talking about. So these are things that have to get better. I jumped them at halftime. I went through, back through everything, and it wasn't a lot. I've got to figure out that space between how many adjustments you can make with a young team, and not overload them. But they gotta meet somewhere too. It can't keep being an excuse. You're either ready to do it or you're not ready to do it, right? And so I thought in the second half, we looked ready to do it, and what you saw was [Gina Garcia] with the post up stuff. You saw [Brandie Harrod] on that spacing away on the dive. You saw [Jordan Speiser] grow up in some chase stuff. She's been taking way too many tough shots. She's gonna shoot a lot of logo type threes, but her feet being set and having space, that was the difference in her game. But I thought Jordan grew up a lot today defensively. I thought this was one of her better defensive games. I thought [Aniya Foy] gave us a big lift. I thought veteran [Tess Heal] has been working really hard to lead a young group. I thought she had a big, big, big second half. I saw a lot of positives."
On seeing the freshman core starting to work with one another …
"When you have this many freshmen that are expected to contribute, but talented enough to contribute, you're going to have some bumps. I've used the word growth a lot. We're going to need them to keep doing what they did today. I think if they keep doing that, we're going to see a lot of improvement, and we'll be on the other side of these."
On the biggest adjustment made by Aniya Foy after being pulled…
"Effort. I've told them I'm patient, but I'm not patient if you're not sprinting back. And I'm not patient, if there's a turnover and you're jogging behind that play, that's not where I'm going to be patient at and it's also why I put her back in a minute later. It was just me making the point. I know that young players are going to make mistakes. My message to them has been, don't let them be effort mistakes. Don't let them be focus mistakes. Let's clean those up, and I'll live with some of the growing pains of college basketball, but I have to make sure that you're playing as hard as you're capable of. I thought she responded great. She had big moments in that, so I was proud of her for doing that, because she's gonna be a heck of a player."
Texas A&M Head Coach Joni Taylor
On what adjustments K-State made in the second half…
"I mean, we knew they were going to come out, they're too good of a team. They're too well coached to not come out and make a run. I think, obviously we saw [Gina] Garcia, you know, trying to post up our guards, and I thought they did a really good job of that. And then the adjustment we made is just to go double her earlier and try to get out of her hands and force somebody else to try to score it who wasn't [Jordan] Speiser or [Taryn] Sides, and then they did a good job of executing that. I thought once we got adjusted we handled it better in the fourth quarter than we did the third."
On if she's shocked in the improvement for both teams in 3-point shooting in today's game…
"Not for Kansas State, I mean, we know they're a team that can shoot the basketball. You know, even watching Speiser in high school, she's a McDonald's All-American for a reason. And so we kept saying, like, this can't be the game where she sees it go in. And of course, it was a game, but just a ton of respect for Coach Mittie and what he does and the offense they run, and how he puts his players in position. So not shocked at all that they shot the ball well. Listen, he's got a lot of new players, we have a lot of new players. I think we both are still trying to get comfortable with playing with each other and learning the offense and so, you know, hopefully for both of us, we continue to get better. I think when you look up in conference play, you got three, four freshmen on the floor for them, they're going to be really tough to deal with once they figure it out."
On what the deciding factor was in the fourth quarter…
"I think we got stops when we needed to. We made free throws. And then Ny Pryor [Ny'Ceara] our point guard just really put the team on her back. She got to the free throw line, she made the right decisions and scored the basketball or got it to the right people."
On their shooting success in the second quarter…
"Absolutely, I think what happened like, obviously, Kansas State came out and dares us to shoot the basketball, and so we just continued to get movement. And then we made a few shots and forced them to come out a little bit. And then from there, we could just continue on our offense. So I was proud of our team for how they were patient, they didn't settle. The 3s we took were the right 3s. 23 is probably a little bit more than what we would normally take, but I was fine with most of them. We knew this was going to be a game where we had to make some shots, and we did."
On the overhaul of the team from last season to this year…
"Well, I don't think it's anything that we didn't like about last year's team, other than we got hurt and we didn't have a full roster, right? But those individuals are great human beings and great players. With that being said, this year's team fits our style of what we want to do as a coaching staff, in terms of our defensive intensity. We have shooters, we have people who can play inside. We've got people who can score, who are three level scorers. And so this team, the culture is wonderful, the chemistry is great. And I'm not saying that last year's team wasn't, we just got hurt at the wrong time last year."
FROM THE FLOOR
K-State Senior Guard Tess Heal
On getting her 1500th career point…
"Yeah it's a nice milestone. I am happy that I did at K-State. This place is really special, and I'm really happy to be here, and playing with this team has been an absolute pleasure, and it's my favorite team that I've played on of the three [Stanford, Santa Clara]. So it's nice to do it here, but obviously the focus is we need to get some wins this season."
On the biggest change at halftime…
"I think just our mentality. We sort of talked about it in the locker room and we said we need to want it more, we need to work harder than them, we need to get on the boards and fight for those hustle plays. I thought [Brandie Harrod] did a great job of diving on the floor and tracking down some loose balls. And I thought everyone lifted their energy and their intensity in the second half. And I think that's why we were able to get back into the game."
On what potential Gina Garcia has…
"The sky's the limit for this one. [Garcia] is an incredible point guard, one of the best I played with. I think the fact that she's played internationally really shows just in her vision and her ability to read the floor and run the point guard. But she's been instrumental for this team, and we're going to need her going forward, and I can't wait to see what she does in the next couple years. She's awesome."
On the performances of the freshmen in the game today and the growth she sees in them…
"I'm incredibly proud of our freshman team. We have some really good young players, and I think that's really exciting for the future of K-State Women's Basketball. They're going to have some great years going forward. I said to [Aniya Foy] in the locker room, I said, 'Aniya, your shot has improved so much since she came here in the summer,' and that's a testament to how much work she's put into it. She's always getting up reps, and I can say that about any one of our freshmen. So I think they're an incredibly talented group, and they're really buying into the process and working hard, and there's a lot of good things to look forward to."
K-State Freshman Guard Jordan Speiser
On the biggest change at halftime…
"Our focus just completely changed. We poured into each other a lot more in the second half, and that's just what we're going to have to do going forward in season. We need to get better at it. But that was a good start."
On how it felt to see a couple of 3s go in after a frustrating start to the season…
"Really nice. I don't know if y'all saw it, but I let my emotions go a little bit. It was great to finally see some fall. I had my teammates telling me in the beginning when I had two not fall early. They were like, it's all right. In the past 24, my shot just felt like I had it back finally. And I was like yeah, we're just gonna keep shooting it. And I saw it go in. So it was definitely relieving to see it go in for sure."
On if they can build off their second half performances for the future…
"Coach Mittie told us after the game we came up short, but the way you guys played, and the way you guys fought, not just individually, but together, that's something that he can work with, and we can all build off of. We just have to keep pouring into each other, and that's the only way it's going to build. And I feel like everyone's really buying into it within these past two losses, everyone's ready to pour into each other more than we have."
K-State Freshman Guard Gina Garcia
On the biggest change at halftime…
"I think that we just tried to do our best and put in all of the energy that we had, today was just not the day to win."
On if the offensive strategy to have her play one-on-one was something previously practiced…
"Well, we have been practicing this yesterday to implement that in the game, and we were just trying to make some points easy, knowing the mismatch that we had, and it was really good."
UP NEXT
K-State concludes its four-game homestand on Tuesday, as the Wildcats host Troy at 6:30 p.m. Tickets for Tuesday's game are available by calling (800) 221-CATS, online at kstatesports.com/tickets and on gameday at the Bramlage Coliseum ticket windows.Â
Tuesday's game is K-State's annual participation in Fort Riley's Operation Santa and the annual Teddy Bear Toss. This season's Teddy Bear Toss will take place before the game, so please arrive early.Â
K-State will accept toy donations for Fort Riley's Operation Santa Claus. Fans are encouraged to bring new, unwrapped toys or gift cards. Fort Riley's Operation Santa Claus helps service members and their families provide gifts to their children during the holiday season. All donations will go towards a Fort Riley Soldier, especially to families under financial constraints and families of deployed, fallen, or injured Soldiers.
Tuesday will also feature Pre-Game Fan Favorites night. Stop by the concession stands prior to select weekday women's basketball games to receive $1 off water, fountain drinks, hot dogs, and nachos from the time doors open until the playing of the National Anthem (while supplies last).
The game will be streamed live on ESPN+ and can be heard on the K-State Sports Network, online at kstatesports.com and on the K-State Sports app and the flagship stations of K-State women's basketball in Manhattan, Sunny 102.5 and 1350 KMAN.
Â
K-State (3-2) saw four players reach double figures, led by senior guard Tess Heal with 15 points on 6-of-8 shooting. With her point total on Sunday, Heal surpassed the 1,500-point mark in her collegiate career.
Joining Heal was the freshmen trio of Brandie Harrod, Gina Garcia and Jordan Speiser with 12 points each. Harrod and Speiser each achieved career-highs in scoring and added six rebounds each to their final lines, while Garcia tallied three rebounds and three assists.
Texas A&M (3-0) was paced by Ny'Ceara Pryor with a game-high 24 points on 10-of-15 shooting.Â
HOW IT HAPPENED
- After Texas A&M built a 12-point advantage, 30-18, freshman guard Aniya Foy ended the run for the Aggies with six points and Taryn Sides added a 3-pointer to bring the Wildcats back to within seven, 34-27, with 1:57 left. Foy ended the game with nine points.
- The Aggies would close the half with a 7-1 run to build a 13-point halftime lead, 41-28. Texas A&M would take the second quarter, 26-15, by shooting 73.3 percent (11-of-15) from the field.
- K-State battled back in the third quarter, pulling to within two points on two occasions, as the Wildcats would win the frame, 31-21, and trail 62-59 entering the fourth. The 31 points were a season-high for a third quarter for K-State this season.
- K-State shot 64.7 percent (11-of-17) from the field in the third, as Harrod tallied seven points and Garcia, Heal and Speiser added six apiece.
- Texas A&M would push its lead back to seven, 68-61, on its 10th three-pointer of the afternoon with 6:35 remaining in the fourth quarter.
- K-State used a 7-0 run to tie the game at 68 with 4:05 to play, highlighted by a deep 3-pointer from Speiser.
- Harrod would finish a layup with 2:34 to play in the fourth quarter to tie the game at 70. This was the closest K-State would come to going in front, as the Aggies ended the game with a 7-2 run, highlighted by a Pryor layup with 1:29 left that gave Texas A&M a four-point advantage, 74-70.
- K-State shot 47.3 percent (26-of-55) from the field, including 47.6 percent (10-of-21) from beyond the arc.
- The Wildcats held a 13-2 advantage in second chance points, doing so on eight offensive rebounds.
QUICK FACTS
- K-State leads the series with Texas A&M, 14-10. The Wildcats are 124-147 (.458) against current members of the SEC. The Wildcats are 7-2 in the series with the Aggies in games played in Manhattan.
- K-State head coach Jeff Mittie owns a career record of 675-380 (.640), including a mark of 221-145 (.604).
- K-State is 415-159 (.723) in its 38th-season inside Bramlage Coliseum, including a 145-51 (.740) record under Mittie. The Wildcats are 240-32 (.882) in non-conference games in Bramlage including an 86-11 (.887) mark during Mittie's time with at K-State.
- The Wildcats are 169-57 (.748) in games played in the month of November. Under head coach Jeff Mittie, K-State is 55-14 (.797) in games during the 11th month.Â
TEAM NOTES
- K-State's starting five consisted of guards Gina Garcia, Brandie Harrod, Tess Heal and Taryn Sides and center Ramiya White. This was the first time this lineup has started together this season. This was the 79th career start for Heal and her fifth at K-State. This was the fifth career start for Harrod. This was the fourth career start for Sides. This was the third career start for Garcia. White made her first career start.
- The Wildcats registered one quarter (third) with 20 or more points on Sunday. Since the start of the quarter system in 2015-16, K-State is 162-67 (.707) when scoring 20 or more points in any quarter in a game. K-State has eight quarters this season with 20 or more points scored.
- K-State had the edge in bench scoring, 27-25. The Wildcats have received 20 or more points from its bench in all five games this season.
PLAYER NOTES
- Speiser reached double figures in points for the second time in her career.
- Speiser connected on a career-high four field goals from long range. This was her first career game with two or more conversions from distance.
- Foy made two three-pointers on Sunday. This was her second career game with two or more connections from long range.
- Izela Arenas pulled in a career-high six rebounds on Sunday. This was her first career game with five or more rebounds.
- Garcia recorded her second career game in double digits for points. This was her second straight game in double figures.
- With her 2-of-2 effort from the foul line on Sunday, Garcia has now made 16 consecutive free throws to begin her career.
- Heal tallied a team-high 15 points. With the effort, she surpassed the career 1,500-point mark (1,503). She joins former Wildcat Gabby Gregory as the second player to surpass the career 1,500-mark after transferring to Kansas State.
- Heal owns 76 career games in double figures, including two this season.
- Harrod carded a career-high in points and her second game this season in double figures.
- Harrod owns four games with five or more rebounds.
- Taryn Sides made two or more 3-point field goals in a game for the 35th time in her career.
FROM THE HEAD COACH
K-State Head Coach Jeff Mittie
On the difference in effort in the second half today compared to previously…
"I think it's better. I think there was a lot of growth in this game, but ultimately, we need to make more plays. The goal is to win the game, figure out how to win the game. So we're never going to be happy with the fact that we didn't do that but, if you didn't see progress today, then you weren't watching the same game I was watching. We had a lot of freshmen out there, a lot of young players, and I thought a lot of them did a lot of really, really good things. So I don't want that to go unnoticed. We're disappointed. It hurts when that happens, but I thought we did some good things today."
On the biggest message coming out of halftime…
"An area that we have to improve in is our focus and our attention to detail. And I was not happy at halftime, because there were about three adjustments that we had made prior to the game, and we were having players out on the floor kind of give that look of, I don't understand what you're talking about. So these are things that have to get better. I jumped them at halftime. I went through, back through everything, and it wasn't a lot. I've got to figure out that space between how many adjustments you can make with a young team, and not overload them. But they gotta meet somewhere too. It can't keep being an excuse. You're either ready to do it or you're not ready to do it, right? And so I thought in the second half, we looked ready to do it, and what you saw was [Gina Garcia] with the post up stuff. You saw [Brandie Harrod] on that spacing away on the dive. You saw [Jordan Speiser] grow up in some chase stuff. She's been taking way too many tough shots. She's gonna shoot a lot of logo type threes, but her feet being set and having space, that was the difference in her game. But I thought Jordan grew up a lot today defensively. I thought this was one of her better defensive games. I thought [Aniya Foy] gave us a big lift. I thought veteran [Tess Heal] has been working really hard to lead a young group. I thought she had a big, big, big second half. I saw a lot of positives."
On seeing the freshman core starting to work with one another …
"When you have this many freshmen that are expected to contribute, but talented enough to contribute, you're going to have some bumps. I've used the word growth a lot. We're going to need them to keep doing what they did today. I think if they keep doing that, we're going to see a lot of improvement, and we'll be on the other side of these."
On the biggest adjustment made by Aniya Foy after being pulled…
"Effort. I've told them I'm patient, but I'm not patient if you're not sprinting back. And I'm not patient, if there's a turnover and you're jogging behind that play, that's not where I'm going to be patient at and it's also why I put her back in a minute later. It was just me making the point. I know that young players are going to make mistakes. My message to them has been, don't let them be effort mistakes. Don't let them be focus mistakes. Let's clean those up, and I'll live with some of the growing pains of college basketball, but I have to make sure that you're playing as hard as you're capable of. I thought she responded great. She had big moments in that, so I was proud of her for doing that, because she's gonna be a heck of a player."
Texas A&M Head Coach Joni Taylor
On what adjustments K-State made in the second half…
"I mean, we knew they were going to come out, they're too good of a team. They're too well coached to not come out and make a run. I think, obviously we saw [Gina] Garcia, you know, trying to post up our guards, and I thought they did a really good job of that. And then the adjustment we made is just to go double her earlier and try to get out of her hands and force somebody else to try to score it who wasn't [Jordan] Speiser or [Taryn] Sides, and then they did a good job of executing that. I thought once we got adjusted we handled it better in the fourth quarter than we did the third."
On if she's shocked in the improvement for both teams in 3-point shooting in today's game…
"Not for Kansas State, I mean, we know they're a team that can shoot the basketball. You know, even watching Speiser in high school, she's a McDonald's All-American for a reason. And so we kept saying, like, this can't be the game where she sees it go in. And of course, it was a game, but just a ton of respect for Coach Mittie and what he does and the offense they run, and how he puts his players in position. So not shocked at all that they shot the ball well. Listen, he's got a lot of new players, we have a lot of new players. I think we both are still trying to get comfortable with playing with each other and learning the offense and so, you know, hopefully for both of us, we continue to get better. I think when you look up in conference play, you got three, four freshmen on the floor for them, they're going to be really tough to deal with once they figure it out."
On what the deciding factor was in the fourth quarter…
"I think we got stops when we needed to. We made free throws. And then Ny Pryor [Ny'Ceara] our point guard just really put the team on her back. She got to the free throw line, she made the right decisions and scored the basketball or got it to the right people."
On their shooting success in the second quarter…
"Absolutely, I think what happened like, obviously, Kansas State came out and dares us to shoot the basketball, and so we just continued to get movement. And then we made a few shots and forced them to come out a little bit. And then from there, we could just continue on our offense. So I was proud of our team for how they were patient, they didn't settle. The 3s we took were the right 3s. 23 is probably a little bit more than what we would normally take, but I was fine with most of them. We knew this was going to be a game where we had to make some shots, and we did."
On the overhaul of the team from last season to this year…
"Well, I don't think it's anything that we didn't like about last year's team, other than we got hurt and we didn't have a full roster, right? But those individuals are great human beings and great players. With that being said, this year's team fits our style of what we want to do as a coaching staff, in terms of our defensive intensity. We have shooters, we have people who can play inside. We've got people who can score, who are three level scorers. And so this team, the culture is wonderful, the chemistry is great. And I'm not saying that last year's team wasn't, we just got hurt at the wrong time last year."
FROM THE FLOOR
K-State Senior Guard Tess Heal
On getting her 1500th career point…
"Yeah it's a nice milestone. I am happy that I did at K-State. This place is really special, and I'm really happy to be here, and playing with this team has been an absolute pleasure, and it's my favorite team that I've played on of the three [Stanford, Santa Clara]. So it's nice to do it here, but obviously the focus is we need to get some wins this season."
On the biggest change at halftime…
"I think just our mentality. We sort of talked about it in the locker room and we said we need to want it more, we need to work harder than them, we need to get on the boards and fight for those hustle plays. I thought [Brandie Harrod] did a great job of diving on the floor and tracking down some loose balls. And I thought everyone lifted their energy and their intensity in the second half. And I think that's why we were able to get back into the game."
On what potential Gina Garcia has…
"The sky's the limit for this one. [Garcia] is an incredible point guard, one of the best I played with. I think the fact that she's played internationally really shows just in her vision and her ability to read the floor and run the point guard. But she's been instrumental for this team, and we're going to need her going forward, and I can't wait to see what she does in the next couple years. She's awesome."
On the performances of the freshmen in the game today and the growth she sees in them…
"I'm incredibly proud of our freshman team. We have some really good young players, and I think that's really exciting for the future of K-State Women's Basketball. They're going to have some great years going forward. I said to [Aniya Foy] in the locker room, I said, 'Aniya, your shot has improved so much since she came here in the summer,' and that's a testament to how much work she's put into it. She's always getting up reps, and I can say that about any one of our freshmen. So I think they're an incredibly talented group, and they're really buying into the process and working hard, and there's a lot of good things to look forward to."
K-State Freshman Guard Jordan Speiser
On the biggest change at halftime…
"Our focus just completely changed. We poured into each other a lot more in the second half, and that's just what we're going to have to do going forward in season. We need to get better at it. But that was a good start."
On how it felt to see a couple of 3s go in after a frustrating start to the season…
"Really nice. I don't know if y'all saw it, but I let my emotions go a little bit. It was great to finally see some fall. I had my teammates telling me in the beginning when I had two not fall early. They were like, it's all right. In the past 24, my shot just felt like I had it back finally. And I was like yeah, we're just gonna keep shooting it. And I saw it go in. So it was definitely relieving to see it go in for sure."
On if they can build off their second half performances for the future…
"Coach Mittie told us after the game we came up short, but the way you guys played, and the way you guys fought, not just individually, but together, that's something that he can work with, and we can all build off of. We just have to keep pouring into each other, and that's the only way it's going to build. And I feel like everyone's really buying into it within these past two losses, everyone's ready to pour into each other more than we have."
K-State Freshman Guard Gina Garcia
On the biggest change at halftime…
"I think that we just tried to do our best and put in all of the energy that we had, today was just not the day to win."
On if the offensive strategy to have her play one-on-one was something previously practiced…
"Well, we have been practicing this yesterday to implement that in the game, and we were just trying to make some points easy, knowing the mismatch that we had, and it was really good."
UP NEXT
K-State concludes its four-game homestand on Tuesday, as the Wildcats host Troy at 6:30 p.m. Tickets for Tuesday's game are available by calling (800) 221-CATS, online at kstatesports.com/tickets and on gameday at the Bramlage Coliseum ticket windows.Â
Tuesday's game is K-State's annual participation in Fort Riley's Operation Santa and the annual Teddy Bear Toss. This season's Teddy Bear Toss will take place before the game, so please arrive early.Â
K-State will accept toy donations for Fort Riley's Operation Santa Claus. Fans are encouraged to bring new, unwrapped toys or gift cards. Fort Riley's Operation Santa Claus helps service members and their families provide gifts to their children during the holiday season. All donations will go towards a Fort Riley Soldier, especially to families under financial constraints and families of deployed, fallen, or injured Soldiers.
Tuesday will also feature Pre-Game Fan Favorites night. Stop by the concession stands prior to select weekday women's basketball games to receive $1 off water, fountain drinks, hot dogs, and nachos from the time doors open until the playing of the National Anthem (while supplies last).
The game will be streamed live on ESPN+ and can be heard on the K-State Sports Network, online at kstatesports.com and on the K-State Sports app and the flagship stations of K-State women's basketball in Manhattan, Sunny 102.5 and 1350 KMAN.
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How to follow the Cats: For complete information on K-State Women's Basketball, visit www.kstatesports.com and follow the team's social media channels on X (formerly Twitter), Facebook and Instagram.
Team Stats
AM
KState
FG%
.474
.473
3FG%
.435
.476
FT%
.722
.667
RB
30
29
TO
11
13
STL
4
5
Game Leaders
Pts
12
FGM
5
3FGM
0
FTM
2
Pts
12
FGM
5
3FGM
0
FTM
2
Pts
12
FGM
4
3FGM
4
FTM
0
Players Mentioned
G
/ Women's BasketballG
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/ Women's BasketballG
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