Eastern women’s basketball team played 30 solid minutes of basketball before falling on the road 73-53 to Austin Peay Monday night.

“The sad part is this was not a 20-point ball game, but that’s all anybody will see,” Panthers head coach Linda Wunder said.

The Governors (13-3, 6-0) were the preseason favorite to win the Ohio Valley Conference this season but were without OVC preseason Player of the Year Brooke Armistead due to a concussion. Monday night marked the first collegiate game that Armistead ever missed in her four year career.

Austin Peay guard Cassandra Peek stepped up to provide a career and game high 19 points in 40 minutes.

“We weren’t mentally tough enough to keep the other team from scoring,” Wunder said.

The Colonels struggled to seperate themselves early from the Panthers (3-14, 2-4) and went into halftime with a 32-27 lead

However, the Panthers were struggling to rebound in the first half and failed to take care of the basketball throughout the game.

“Of our four perimeter players, not one had a single offensive rebound,” Wunder said. “We had a stretch of too many turnovers in the second half.”

With 14 minutes left in the game, Eastern was able to tie the game but then had consecutive breakdowns on offense that gave the Governors momentum.

“I thought we did some good things in the second half, but then we turned the ball over on three of our next four possesions,” Wunder said.

The Panthers came out of the locker room and hit five of their first seven shots to close the gap. However, the Panthers went incredibly cold the rest of the evening by hitting only five of last their 23 shots.

“When we got behind, we took some bad shots and forced some things,” Wunder said.

Lauren Dailey led the Panthers in scoring with 12 points but had a disappointing evening leading the offense by committing five of the Panthers 18 turnovers. Panthers freshman guard Megan Sparks had an off night, earning only eight points on 3-of-12 shooting.

The second half woes hit every Panther with Eastern’s shooting percentage dropping from 48 to 33 percent. Also, the Panthers were three of four from beyond the arc in the opening twenty minutes but missed all six attempts in the final frame.