BY TRAVIS CRAM l AVALANCHE-JOURNAL

LINCOLN, Neb. — Texas Tech went on a 19-4 run in the final 7:34 of its game Saturday at Devaney Sports Center against Nebraska, fueled by Jordan Murphree’s three 3-pointers and 13 points during the run.

But the Cornhuskers’ four points during the run was all they needed to help seal the 62-56 win.

“Close but not close enough,” Tech head coach Kristy Curry said.

Tech (14-10, 4-6 Big 12 Conference) needed more points early on after going down 56-37 with less than eight minutes to play, but could find very little help from the inside — especially from Dominic Seals who sat out the remaining 5:28 after hitting only 2 of 9 from the field for four points and grabbing five rebounds.

Jordan Murphree

The Lady Raiders also had to make do without senior point guard Maria Moore. She did not start the game due to a bone bruise on her left knee she suffered in the win Wednesday against Texas A&M.

“I didn’t like (Seals’) effort as a senior on the road in Big 12 play when our backs are against the wall. I was disappointed in her effort today for 30 minutes. Obviously we struggled without Moore, there’s no question about it. But there are no excuses. … We weren’t able to rise above (adversity) today and that especially starts with Dominic.”

Murphree’s free throws and jumper and senior Tiny Henderson’s three field goals started off the run to cut the lead to 56-47 with 4:02 to play.

Nebraska’s Cory Montgomery — who finished with 17 points and 11 rebounds for her sixth double-double — hit the only field goal of the final seven minutes for the Cornhuskers to push the lead back to 11 before Murphree, who finished with a game-high 18 points, drained the first of three consecutive 3-pointers. The final trey followed a pair of free throws by Montgomery to make it 60-56 with 48 seconds left.

But Mallard was double-teamed and missed a shot underneath and Henderson failed to hit a jumper from the free-throw line after Catheryn Redmon missed the first of a 1-and-1 opportunity but sunk the next two free throws.

Redmon would miss two more from the line with 13 seconds left but Dominique Kelley grabbed the rebound and watched the clock finally wind down.

Nebraska (11-12, 2-8) beat Tech for the first time in 13 attempts — its last win coming on Feb. 9, 1997 in a 62-57 win in Lincoln and snapped a five-game losing streak.

“We like to make it interesting,” Nebraska coach Connie Yori said with a smile on her face for the first time in weeks. “I wasn’t ready to walk out of the gym and think we had that thing won and neither were they. … I’m ecstatic. People just don’t quite understand how hard it is to win one, single ballgame in this league.”

The loss denied Tech a consecutive Big 12 win again. The Lady Raiders have not won consecutive conference games since winning back-to-back home games against Kansas and Nebraska last season. Tech has not won consecutive home-away games since 2007 (vs. Texas, at Kansas).

Nebraska used its defensive pressure early on to force seven turnovers by the Lady Raiders. The Cornhuskers went on a 10-2 run to push their lead to 15-9 while Tech went without a field goal for nearly four minutes.

The Lady Raiders would tie it up at 19-19 with five minutes left on Henderson’s jumper to cap a 10-4 run of its own.

But Nebraska continued to give Tech problems inside and forced a total of 12 turnovers in the first half as Yvonne Turner’s 3-pointer with 28 seconds left put the Cornhuskers up 28-23 at the break. Tech had only two field goals in the final 4:50 of the first half while Nebraska scored nine points.

The loss leaves Curry with six more chances to win enough games to stay in the hunt for a NCAA Tournament berth and better seeding in the Big 12 tournament before the talk may quickly turn to the WNIT.

“We’ve got to realize that this thing isn’t over and we’ve got a great opportunity with six games to go,” Curry said. “We need to get three or four or five, six more. I think that’s where we’re at — three, four, five or six and we’ll decide who we want to be.”

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