LOUISVILLE, Ky. — From blowout to barnburner.

That was the difference in play when the Bellarmine University women's basketball team traveled to meet Missouri-St. Louis on Sunday at the Mark Twain Building for the second time in two weeks. The rematch came in the opening round of the Great Lakes Valley Conference Tournament and wasn't decided until the final possession.

Unfortunately for the ninth-seeded Knights, the level of competitiveness drastically changed but ultimately the outcome didn't as the eighth-seeded Tritons squeaked out a 66-61 victory.

Sophomore guard Destony Curry scored a team-high 11 points for Bellarmine, which finishes its season at 14-13. Sophomore guard Whitney Hartlage added nine points and junior center Jennifer Smith and freshman guard Raven Merriweather chipped in eight apiece for the Knights, who suffered an 80-59 loss to the Tritons (14-13) on Feb. 14, their most lopsided setback of the season.

That's not how the Round 2 played out.

With 2:49 left in regulation, Curry spotted Hartlage for a 3-pointer that cut Bellarmine's six-point deficit in half. The Tritons' Kelly Kunkel, who scored a game-high 20 points, followed with a layup, but Merriweather sank the Knights' second trifecta in less than a minute. After Curry sank a pair of free throws, BU had raced back to within 60-59 with 54 seconds left.

Missouri-St. Louis' Kelly McGovern and Bellarmine junior guard Mackenzie Martinez, who had been out multiple games due to injury, exchanged layups to maintain the one-point differential with 24 seconds left. The Knights were forced to foul Amber Daly, who hit both of her free throws with 18 seconds remaining.

Bellarmine had a final possession to attempt to tie the game, but the Knights committed a turnover as Daly made a steal with three seconds left. McGovern iced the victory with a pair of free throws.

After getting outrebounded by 16 in the first meeting against Missouri-St. Louis, Bellarmine held a 36-23 advantage in the rematch. UMSL shot 50 percent from the field to the 43.4 percent of BU, and the Tritons hit two more 3-pointers — five to three — than the Knights.

Missouri-St. Louis took a seven-point lead, its largest of the game, at the 13:33 mark of the first half. A pair of baskets by Martinez and another by Merriweather got Bellarmine back within one in less than two minutes, and it remained tight the rest of the half as Smith canned a pair of free throws to knot the score at 27 heading into halftime.

Curry's jumper with 11:50 remaining in the second half tied the game for the ninth time. Tierra Snow followed with the go-ahead basket, and the Tritons led the rest of the way although the Knights never trailed by more than six. In fact, on four occasions, BU cut its deficit to one, but the Knights never quite got over the hump.

Bellarmine only loses one player to graduation in senior forward Morgan Clemons, the team's leading rebounder. The Knights' four leading scorers — Merriweather, Hartlage, Curry and freshman forward Beth Bowers — were all underclassmen.

BOX SCORE (HTM)