TEMPE, Ariz. — On the five-year anniversary of its first victory in the NCAA Tournament, the UALR women's basketball team got its second on Saturday.
Taylor Gault scored a season-high 25 points, Kiera Clark had a career-high 21 points and No. 11 seed UALR led for the majority of a 69-60 victory over No. 6 Texas A&M at Wells Fargo Arena.
The victory comes five years to the day after UALR beat Georgia Tech in the 2010 NCAA Tournament, and snapped a string of three consecutive tournament losses since. It was also Coach Joe Foley's 700th career victory, and this one came against a friend in Texas A&M Coach Gary Blair.
Gault made 10 of 17 shots and almost single-handedly lifted the Trojans (29-4) from a rut in the middle of the second half to pull away.
Texas A&M (23-10) took a 34-31 lead early in the second half, but Gault's three-point tied the game four minutes in and the Trojans never trailed again.
Gault made three more threes in the second half, the last of which came as the shot clock was winding down and gave UALR a 56-50 lead with 5:25 left.
Clark, who added 12 rebounds off the bench, made her first four shots to help UALR take a 21-12 lead in the first half. But Clark missed her next six before getting going again.
She scored on three consecutive UALR possessions after Gault's three-pointer and her free throws with 46.1 seconds left made it 66-57 and sealed UALR's first victory in the NCAA Tournament since beating Georgia Tech in 2010 in Norman, Okla.
Courtney Williams led Texas A&m with 23 points and Courtney Walker had 10. UALR held Texas A&M to 36.7 shooting from the field. Texas A&M lost in the first round of the NCAA Tournament for the first time in nine tournament appearances.
UALR will play either No. 3 seed Arizona State or No. 14 Ohio on Monday night.
Read Sunday's Arkansas Democrat-Gazette for full details.