The Marshalltown girls’ basketball team led by as many as seven points early, trailed by nine points late, and wound up just shy of its second-straight victory after Monday’s 32-28 loss to Des Moines Lincoln.

Fresh off their first win of the season, the Bobcats (1-10) missed the chance to make it back-to-back triumphs for the first time in 12 years. Des Moines Lincoln (2-4) left the door open for Marshalltown to knock it down, but the Bobcats couldn’t make the big plays the same as they had two nights earlier at Des Moines Hoover.

MHS led by as many as seven points in the second quarter, fell behind by nine midway through the third, but found themselves in another competitive contest in Monday’s CIML clash at the Roundhouse.

Marshalltown scored the first six points of the fourth quarter to tie the game at 27-all, but the Railsplitters made just enough plays down the stretch to escape the Bobcats’ grasp.

T-R PHOTO BY ROSS THEDE

“It’s nice when the level of a team is somewhat comparable to where we are currently,” said MHS head coach Brian Murphy. “I thought we got outworked on a number of occasions tonight, and you can chalk that up to a short schedule where we had a game on Saturday, but at the end of the day [Lincoln] also played on Saturday so it’s not like they had any more of an advantage than we did.

“One team comes in and is looking to scrap and I thought we had moments where we rose to that, but I didn’t think we matched their level of energy for long stretches of the game.”

The Bobcats’ bugaboo on this night was turnovers, as 29 miscues made it harder than it had to be. Des Moines Lincoln also switched into a zone defense during the second quarter, and the Railsplitters outscored their hosts 8-2 over the final five minutes of the half as a result.

Marshalltown junior Lily Roberts scored eight points in a row to help chase the Rails out of the man-to-man defense, and Lincoln captured control with a 19-18 halftime lead.

The Bobcats sputtered to start the half, turning the ball over on their first three possessions as the Railsplitters scored eight-straight to open the quarter. In all it was a 16-0 run that got Lincoln out of an 18-11 deficit and into a 27-18 lead.

T-R PHOTO BY ROSS THEDE

MHS eventually mustered up enough patience to break down Des Moines Lincoln’s zone defense, as Roberts found Malena Kammerer for an easy layup late in the third quarter that got the Bobcats back within striking distance, 27-21.

Roberts put back a pair of offensive rebounds for buckets and Rachel Smith swished a long two-pointer on an inbounds play to bring MHS back to a tie, 27-all, with 3:10 left in the fourth.

Lincoln’s Desirae Bundy got a pair of free throws to go down, and she turned a steal into a layup to boost the Railsplitters’ lead back to four, 31-27.

Both teams went 1-for-3 from the free-throw line the rest of the way and MHS made three more costly turnovers as the chance to complete the comeback escaped.

“We keep coming back to this idea that until we learn to learn from our mistakes, it’s going ot continue to be a long season,” Murphy said, “and we were trying to make pases tonight that have not been there all year. Again, we have moments where we show we kknow what we need to do, but we keep reverting back and we’ve got to move past that point.”

T-R PHOTO BY ROSS THEDE

Roberts finished with team-highs of 15 points and 12 rebounds for the double-double, but she was the only Bobcat with more than three points. Sara Huffman hit a 3-pointer in the first quarter, while Sophie Younkin had two points and 11 rebounds. Carlye Castillo and Kaylin Smith also added field goals in the loss.

“We talked a lot about coming in and being the more physical and more assertive team, because in the second half against Hoover that’s what won us that game because we finally decided that we were going to lay it all on the line and scrap for everything,” Murphy said. “I thought we did that for moments in the first half tonight where we came out really strong … but again we have to learn from our mistakes and adjust on the fly.”

Morgan Methfessel, Kira Canada and Riley Cox led Des Moines Lincoln with seven points apiece.

Marshalltown goes out on the road tonight to face Ottumwa in another cross-CIML contest.

Des Moines Lincoln 32, Marshalltown 28

DM LINCOLN (2-4) — Morgan Methfessel 3 0-0 7, Desirae Bundy 1 3-6 5, Jaida Taylor 2 1-1 7, Kira Canada 1 1-2 3, Marissa Albright 1 1-5 3, Jaida Kenworthy 0 0-0 0, Sayli Simms 0 0-0 0, Riley Cox 2 3-6 7, Abigail Pfeifer 0 0-0 0. TOTALS 10 9-20 32.

MARSHALLTOWN (1-10) — Rachel Smith 1 0-0 2, Lily Roberts 5 5-7 15, Sara Huffman 1 0-0 3, Sophie Younkin 0 2-4 2, Kaylin Smith 1 0-0 2, Mya Gallegos 0 0-0 0, Carlye Castillo 1 0-0 2, Malena Kammerer 1 0-0 2, Amaya Moore 0 0-0 0. TOTALS 10 7-11 28.

DM LINCOLN 7 12 8 5 — 32

MHS 8 10 3 7 — 28

3-Point Goals–DML 3 (Taylor 2, Methfessel), MHS 1 (Huffman). Team Fouls–DML 15, MHS 14. Fouled out–none.