Freshmen Shine But Thunderbirds Fall at North Dakota State 63-50
This entry was posted on 1/21/2008 11:42 PM and is filed under Girls Youth Basketball, Girls Basketball News.
| Freshmen Shine But Thunderbirds Fall at North Dakota State 63-50 |
| Courtesy: Southern Utah Athletics Release: 01/21/2008 |
FARGO, N.D. - Jan. 21 - Southern Utah women's basketball will have to wait for its first road win of the season after a 63-50 set back at North Dakota State on Monday night. The loss drops the Thunderbirds to 3-15 overall and 1-6 in the Summit League. North Dakota State improves to 9-9 and 4-4 in conference.
"This game was a lot closer than what the score would lead you to believe," Hodson said after the game. "If we were to have gotten a few more breaks this could have been a lot more closer. This definitely gives us something to build on."
North Dakota State capitalized on three early Thunderbird turnovers to build a seven-point lead (13-6) with 13:53 showing on the clock. However a staunch SUU defense over the next four minutes, including a jumper by freshman Kaila Goff and a lay-up by junior Anne Westwood cut the deficit to three (13-10) with 9:40 on the clock.
Minutes later, NDSU's Brenda Slyt got hot behind the arc and hit three consecutive 3-point field goals to build the Bison lead to its largest of 12 (24-12) with 6:47 on the game clock. The lead continued to hover in the double digits for the home team, but a mini 4-0 run over the final minute of the half for the Thunderbirds made the score 32-25 going into the intermission.
Southern Utah opened the second half with the first basket to trim the Bison lead to five (32-27), but an 11-2 Bison run over a six minute span ran the score to 47-33 for the largest lead of the game.
The Thunderbirds countered with a 13-2 run of their own and trimmed the lead to the smallest margin of the game at three (49-46) with 6:30 remaining in the game. Freshmen Jamie Sagers and Caitlyn Sears made up ten of the 13 in the run with Sagers picking up a one of her three blocks on the evening in the stretch.
The Bison answered and closed the game on a 14-4 run to clinch the victory 63-50 when the final whistle blew.
Despite the loss the story of the game was Southern Utah's freshmen, making up 34 of 50 Thunderbird points and 27 of the 38 total rebounds. Sagers and fellow freshman Challis Pascucci combined for six blocks on the night and Sears recorded another as the first-year players made up seven of the eight blocks.
Sears led all SUU scorers with 13, 11 coming in the second half and filled the box score with seven rebounds, one block, one steal and one assist. Pascucci narrowly missed second double double of the season with nine points and a game-high ten rebounds.
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| Courtesy: TBD |
