Tigers take Utah State women basketball by the tail
The Aggies were looking for another win in Stockton, Calif., against the Pacific Tigers, but they fell to the Tigers 67-58 in a difficult game.
Things weren’t all bad though, Brittany Hagen managed to have the game of her career, scoring the last five points of the game for the Aggies and finishing with 15 points and five rebounds.
“I just wanted to do the most I could with the minutes I was in [the game],” said Hagen.
Utah State Head Coach Raegan Pebley said of Hagen, “We were worried that we would take a big step back when Hagen hurt her shoulder in the Santa Barbara game. But she came back more aggressive. She hates losing.”
Even though they lost, many Aggies were able to have a good game. The game actually started out well for the Aggies, at least for Ali Aird.
Aird outscored Pacific 6-3 in the beginning of the half, then hit a three-pointer to help the Aggies lead for most of the first half. She was quiet for the rest of the first half, until she hit another three at the buzzer. She finished the game with 15 points and 10 rebounds.
Christina Zdenek put her minutes in the game to good use, contributing 12 points for Utah State. Coming into the game Zdenek was ranked 27th in the country in free-throw percentage, but was unable to show her strength, going to the line only five times.
The Aggies couldn’t hold on to their first-half lead.
Pacific had some players that USU had trouble holding back, though they managed to tame Andrea Nederostik, leading scorer for the Tigers. Nederostik averaged 19 points in conference games before she faced the Aggies. The Aggies, making the same mistake they did against Weber State, managed to control Nederostik, holding her to only six points but allowing other players to step up.
PSU’s Nancy Dinges made her mark on the board, playing the entire game and leading the Tigers in scoring with 16 points, the first 12 of which came from three-pointers. USU also had trouble stopping Corinne Wong who, although fairly quiet in the first half, came out extremely aggressive during the second half to put 14 points up on the board.
Once again the Aggies had trouble blocking shots playing against a team that had several players taller than them. Alicia Smith, at 6-foot-6, was able to tally nine points with little difficulty. Smith is three inches taller than USU’s tallest player, Ali Aird.
The Aggies led in rebounding for the first half, but allowed PSU to outrebound them in the second half. The game ended with the teams tied in rebounding at 33 boards apiece.
“I didn’t think that we were as aggressive as we needed to be [with rebounding],” said Pebley. “Something we need to work on at practice.”
The Aggies stay on the road and go up against Northridge on Saturday at 8 p.m. According to Pebley, the game will be very different from the one played tonight.
“They will force us to shoot outside,” she said. “The game will be a lot slower and we will try to be more aggressive.”
USU is hopeful that it will be able to improve its record against the California team, although they know it will be a difficult game and can’t write it down as a win. But the team will play hard.
“We put up a good fight in every game,” Hagen said. “We fight for the whole 40 minutes but always fall short. Against Cal Poly we did something different and we just need to figure out what that is and keep doing it.”
-aedmunds@cc.usu.edu