There was no fanfare or confetti as Middle Tennessee women’s basketball’s season ended in in the first round of the NCAA Women’s Basketball Invitational Tournament, losing to Belmont 64-51.  

The Lady Raiders’ postseason struggles rolled over from the Conference USA finals, with shots not falling and foul trouble arising across the board.  

Middle Tennessee’s starting lineup struggled in the size match up against Belmont with forward Elina Arike playing only four minutes. MTSU head coach Rick Insell subbed in guards Savannah Davis and Jada Harrison in an attempt to match up with the smaller Belmont lineup. 

“We were playing a couple young ladies in a position that they are not going to play, they were not recruited to play that position,” Insell said. “I thought they did a good job doing what they had to do.”  

Senior center Anastasiia Boldyreva started the game by controlling the paint against Belmont’s Kendal Cheesman, scoring her first four attempts in the first quarter. Boldyreva lost touch around the rim as the game went on though, scoring only one basket in the last three quarters. 

The Lady Raiders’ foul trouble hit hard when guard Jalynn Gregory fouled out along with getting injured. In the second quarter, Gregory tried to take charge and came up limping.  

Gregory sat for the last four minutes of the half and came back in the second half with a wrap around her knee. The senior committed her fifth foul with 8:50 left in the game, effectively ending her time as a Lady Raider.  

With Gregory out of the game, Middle Tennessee lost its floor leader. The senior started all four years of her career and played every minute in 17 games this season.  

“Sometimes you get caught in a catch-22 where you think we won 26 games with it and we didn’t make any changes,” Insell said. “Probably in the end it cost us to be honest with you, maybe we should have been working on this situation back in November and December.” 

Belmont took advantage of the Lady Raiders’ foul trouble, knocking down nearly 40% of their shots and 34% from beyond the arc.  

Belmont and Middle Tennessee played earlier in the season, with a similar result of the Bruins outshooting the Lady Raiders and shutting down MTSU in the paint.  

The scouting report showed that Cheesman was going to be a threat, but the Lady Raiders held her to nine points on the day. Despite this, Belmont had the better matchup inside late in the game, Insell said.  

Going into next season, Middle Tennessee will be an almost entirely new team with four of its starters graduating. Current junior guard Ta’Mia Scott will be the only returning starter for the Lady Raiders.  

“I’m excited about next year to be honest with you,” Insell said. “We got a great recruiting class coming in and a lot of young players on the bench that are in the weight room, conditioning and getting in the gym shooting shots. I could see two or three of them stepping up, we are going to be a different type of team.”