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It took two overtimes, but the Wisconsin women’s basketball team was able to hold off in-state rival UW-Milwaukee 71-69 at the Kohl Center last night.

The Badgers were led by junior forward Mariah Dunham’s 16 points in 26 minutes off the bench. Sophomores Alyssa Karel and Tara Steinbauer each tallied 11 points, and freshman Jade Davis chipped in 10 of her own. UW also helped itself out greatly by making 20 of 23 free throw attempts after coming into the game shooting only 58 percent, last in the Big Ten. Wisconsin outscored UW-Milwaukee 39-8 in points off the bench.

The Badgers, who led by as many as 16 points in the second half, needed a late 3-pointer by Dunham just to send the game into overtime after an 18-4 run by the Panthers. In the extra frame, the Badgers trailed by three points with only seconds remaining until Karel nailed a 3-pointer with 7.4 seconds left to send the game into a second overtime.

In the second overtime, the Badgers started with a 6-0 run and were able to hold off the Panthers, who had a chance with 5 seconds left to tie or win the game but weren’t able to get off a clean look.

The Panthers were led by 30 points scored by Traci Edwards, who set the UW-Milwaukee career scoring record in the process. Both teams started out very slow, with the Panthers shooting only 27 percent from the field in the first half while the Badgers shot only 32 percent. However, Milwaukee picked it up in the second half, outscoring the Badgers 36-25, shooting 46 percent to erase an 11-point halftime deficit.

“A win is a win,” Wisconsin coach Lisa Stone said. “We’ll take the win and the result on the correct side of the column. I’m really proud of the players for holding on and showing resiliency and overcoming the run that they had. We had some lulls offensively, but overall we did enough to get it done.”

This was Wisconsin’s first overtime game of the year, and it came during a time when the team had just played three games in the Virgin Islands last weekend. However, the Badgers were able to overcome their fatigue and major foul trouble in the second half and overtime to squeak by the Panthers to improve their record to 19-3 overall against UW-Milwaukee.

“I honestly didn’t think about our team getting tired,” Stone said. “We just talked about getting it done, getting stops, getting rebounds and making free throws. I know that they’re tired now, but they’re going to recover quickly because we’ve got a game coming up shortly.”

Dunham, who recorded her season-high in points while shooting 50 percent from the floor and 83 percent from the foul line, saw the situation in the same light as her coach.

“During the game we weren’t really thinking that we were tired,” Dunham said. “No one really mentioned it, and I think that helped us because we forgot that we had just came back from a road trip and just played a really tough team. We just stuck it out.”

The key play in the game came when Karel hit her 3-pointer late in the first overtime. Milwaukee had just taken the lead after a 3-pointer from Amanda Viehauser with 26 seconds left and momentum was clearly on the side of the Panthers. Davis missed a 3-pointer for the Badgers, but fortunately for Wisconsin, the ball went off the hands of a Panther to give UW another chance. Karel got the ball a few feet beyond the arc at the top of the key and her shot was true, making up for an otherwise off night — this was her only make in seven 3-point attempts.

“It was a big boost,” junior guard Rae Lin D’Alie said. “We went into the [second] overtime with the momentum, and sure enough we started off with a 6-0 run right away. That three was just huge. At that point we were like ‘shoot, we’re behind,’ but that three gave us all the momentum.”