JACKSONVILLE – Jacksonville State women's basketball won a thriller in overtime Thursday evening over the UTEP Miners in a 72-71 final. Junior guard Clara Gonzalez Planella drained the game winning floater as the buzzer sounded to clinch the win for the Gamecocks.
 
Planella's two pointer to win the game put her at 14 points for the second most on Jax State. Asia Barclay led the Red-and-White with 16 points on an efficient 7-9 shooting. Barclay also had a team-high six rebounds. Valentina Saric joined Barclay and Planella in double-figures with 12 points on four made threes.
 
The first quarter saw Barclay storm out the gates with six straight baskets for the Gamecocks. The Miners matched her six by the time the media break rolled around at 4:31 mark. Once Saric entered around midway through the period, she hit two threes to match Barclay with six points apiece. Jax State was leading the Miners 19-12 after the first.
 
The Miners and Gamecocks continued to battle throughout the second period. Planella had eight points for the Gamecocks, while UTEP led 24-22 at the media timeout in the quarter. A Saric three with 46 seconds remaining gave the Gamecocks a 31-28 advantage that was short lived as UTEP drained a three with 17 seconds left in the half to tie it up. At the half, the score was 31 all.
 
Out of halftime, Jax State went on a 9-2 run to jump out to a 46-37 lead with 5:46 left in the third thanks in part to back-to-back made threes from Samiya Steele. A pair of made free throws by UTEP cut the Gamecocks' lead to 46-39 midway through the quarter. By the end of the third, the score was 50-47 in favor of Jax State.
 
UTEP got the lead 53-50 after a 6-0 run early in the fourth quarter that forced a Jax State timeout. The Miners got up as much as six points, but the Gamecocks came crawling back and eventually regained the lead 63-61 with 23 seconds remaining in regulation. UTEP tied the game back up at 63-63 with a made layup with 19 seconds remaining. Barclay hit a layup with 16 seconds left and was fouled. She hit the and-one foul shot to put the Gamecocks up 66-64. UTEP would answer again with seven seconds left to tie it up as the game headed to overtime.
 
UTEP regained the lead at 69-68 with only 2:47 left on the clock. Steele responded with a pair of made foul shots to give Jax State a 70-69 advantage with two-and-a-half minutes remaining. Both teams would go through scoring droughts before UTEP took the lead 71-70 with only 15 seconds left. Planella's game winning floater came on a baseline out of bounds play drawn up by head coach Rick Pietri after he took a 30 second timeout with seven seconds on the clock.
 
Jax State will play at home again Saturday, Jan. 25, against the New Mexico State Aggies. The game time is set for a 1:30 p.m. tip off. The game will be streaming on ESPN+ and tickets are available at JaxStateSports.com.
 
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