Mara Braun stars in Gophers' double-OT win over Drake

Mara Braun led the Minnesota Gophers to a comeback win over Drake in a double-overtime thriller at The Barn that ended 94-88.

Minnesota trailed by six at the half and Drake carried a nine-point lead into the fourth quarter at 61-52. They grew the lead to 11 points at 65-54 with 7:50 left in the fourth before Minnesota stormed back.

Mara Braun hit a 3-pointer to trim the deficit to 72-69 with 1:48 to go and despite trailing 74-69 with under a minute left in fourth, Grace Grocholski hit a 3 with 39 seconds left and then Janay Sanders forced a steal and turned it into a layup to tie the game 74-74 with 23 seconds to play.

In overtime, Braun hit a jumper to start the scoring and later finished an and-1 layup for an 81-76 lead, but Drake answered with 3 with 1:34 to go to make it a two-point game at 81-79.

2️⃣3️⃣ Points!!!!@marabraun10 pic.twitter.com/KEFUMCz9sO
— Minnesota Women's Basketball (@GopherWBB) December 2, 2023

Braun put the Gophers on her back with another jumper with 23 seconds to go for an 83-79 lead, but Drake got a free throw and a game-tying 3 by Anna Miller with five seconds left to force a second overtime.

Braun wasn’t done. After Drake took an 85-83 lead, the former Wayzata High School star hit another triple for an 86-85 lead. A jumper from Sophie Hart put Minnesota up 88-86 with exactly three minutes to go.

Two more free throws by Braun pushed the lead to four and it went to six after a Mallory Heyer bucket with 1:51 left, and held on to claim the win.

Only six Gophers scored in the game but all them were in double figures.

Mara Braun: 33 points
Mallory Heyer: 16 points
Grace Grocholski: 12 points
Amaya Battle: 11 points
Sophie Hart: 12 points
Janay Sanders: 10 points

Drake was 5-2 coming into the game, with their other losses to Richmond and Iowa, the latter of which was a 113-90 loss against Caitlin Clark and the No. 2 Hawkeyes.

Up next: Gophers at Kentucky, Wednesday at 6 p.m. CT.