Women hoopsters fall to N. Colorado
After a 21-point game against Southern Utah University last week, Christina Zdenek had three points, five fouls and no rebounds for Utah State University in their 68-62 loss to Northern Colorado University.
“We shouldn’t have lost this game,” junior transfer Kahlie Quinones. “No way, no how. We should have come out hard in warm-ups. They just seemed to have more heart than us and that’s something that I never like to say.”
From the beginning of the game, the Aggies had a tough time finding the basket, shooting a dismal 29 percent, while taking nearly double the amount of shots the Bears did. The half ended with the Ags down by one, 30-31.
“We were missing point-blank shots and we can’t do that,” head coach Raegan Pebley said. “That just kills you. You work so hard to get a good shot … then not to reward ourselves with a point. We’ve got to get some kids knocking stuff down in that two to four foot range.”
Ali Aird led the way for the Ags with 14 points and six rebounds. It was the first time so far this season Aird has shot 50 percent in a game.
Three other Aggies also had double-digits. Jessica Freeman had 13 points and seven boards while Brittany Tressler and Taylor Richards had 12 and 10 points respectively.
Quinones, playing in front of a home-town crowd, didn’t have a strong game offensively with only four points. However, she was able to pull down six rebounds and had four steals.
The shots raining down from behind the arc proved to be the Aggies’ achilles heel in their loss.
“[They] have a system where they are either gonna get beat by 40, or they are going to barely beat a team,” Pebley said. “They will never blow anybody out. No matter how good they get or who they play.
“We actually held them to 10 less 3-point shots than they usually take. They just started hitting them tonight.”
Jena Fosdick led the way for the Bears with 19 points, 12 coming from behind the 3-point line. Heather Barbour was also strong behind the arc with three. She ended the game with 11 points.
Kayla Flavin was the only other NCU player that scored more than 10 points with 15 for the night.
“I think that [missing shots] does have an effect,” Quinones said. “When you are out there and you’re not seeing the shot fall, that can hurt you. We’ve just got to keep shooting and eventually they will start going in. We can’t let this loss have any effect on us.”
“I don’t want to characterize this team with this one game that we can’t shoot,” Pebley said. “In our last three games we’ve done a great job shooting. I can come up with a lot of excuses, but I don’t think we were ready to play tonight.”
The Aggies are now trying to prepare for their next game on Saturday. Pebley said one thing the team was really good at last year was their ability to rebound and play well after losses.
“After two wins, we might of got a little ahead of ourselves coming into this game,” Quinones said. “Tomorrow we will definitely be going at it and going at each other. I’m already thinking about the next game.”
The Aggies next face Air Force Saturday at 2 p.m.
-aedmunds@cc.usu.edu