Women hoopsters win in overtime
After a disappointing loss to the last team in the Big West Conference, the Utah State women’s basketball team rebounded with a 70-63 overtime win over UC Riverside Saturday night in California.
“That was the best win of our program’s history,” head coach Raegan Pebley said. “Not so much because Riverside is so good, but just because of the situation and that it was an overtime game. We just really had to work for everything, and our kids did.”
The Aggies trailed for most of the first half and in the beginning of the second. A layup from Taylor Richards with a little more than 16 minutes left gave the Aggies their first lead since early in the game. Richards continued to spark the offense and led the way for the Aggies with 18 points.
In the loss to Cal State Fullerton, USU’s three leading scorers combined for 12 points. But against UCR Brittany Tressler, Ali Aird and Richards combined for 37 points. Aird had 11 points while Tressler, the leading scorer for Utah State, didn’t score until late in the second half. She finished the night with eight points.
The Ags and the Highlanders traded the lead for most of the second half, with the Ags leading by as much as eight with eight minutes left to play in the game.
Foul trouble in the second half gave the Highlanders free throws and the opportunity to cut the Aggie lead. In the second half the Aggies had 15 fouls called on them to Riverside’s five.
“We’ve had situations where the refs are obviously not on our side and we’ve been trained to play through that,” Christina Zdenek said. “Tonight the refs were not on our side, [but] I think they made up for it a little in overtime.”
“I told them no matter what, you don’t say anything to the officials,” Pebley said. “Our focus is to win this game. We’re not here to find excuses to lose. We are here to win this game. And we’re not going to go in to defend them, we’re going in to attack them.”
With 53 seconds left, a foul from Aird sent Riverside’s Kemie Nkele to the line to shoot two. Nkele made both free throws to tie the game at 63. At the other end of the court, Camille Brox was called for a travel and gave the ball, as well as a chance to take the lead, back to the Highlanders.
However, UCR was unable to score and sent the game into overtime.
During overtime the Ags held Riverside scoreless and scorerd seven points for the win.
With the win, the Ags improved to 4-3 in conference play and are once again tied for fourth in conference with Riverside as well as Cal Poly.
Utah State will next face UC Irvine Thursday night in the Spectrum.
“Irvine is going to be such a similar situation as Fullerton,” Pebley said. “They’ve got the exact same record, they’re sitting at last in the conference. You’ve got to win those games at home and you’ve got to beat those teams you’re supposed to beat and Irvine is like that.”
Pebley said the Aggies will have to look at the game tape from Fullerton as well as the Irvine tapes to find out how the team is going to win the game.
Overall, Pebley said she was proud of her team’s performance, and knows they can continue to do well.
She added that she would like to see more fans at the home games.
“Bring people with you,” she said. “I want some crowds for our kids. They deserve it.”
-aedmunds@cc.usu.edu