On Helena Pueyo’s birthday, the Arizona women’s basketball team beat rival ASU 62-58 at home in McKale Center on Sunday, Feb. 13.
In the first quarter, Arizona looked more put together offensively and defensively than on Friday. ASU came out strong but was met by Arizona for a competitive quarter. Bendu Yeaney led the team with 5 points.
Arizona as a team shot 4-5 from the field in the quarter and 6-10 from the free-throw line. Arizona ended the quarter down 17-15 to ASU.
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Much like the first quarter, the second quarter was close. Cate Reese and Madison Conner led the way for the team. Reese opened the quarter with a layup and had 8 points in the quarter and Conner had 7 points.
Conner was a spark plug for Arizona off the bench, shooting 3-5 from the field and 1-2 from the 3-point line in the quarter to give her 10 points in the game. The Wildcats’ largest lead of the quarter was a 6 point lead, but ASU hit some big 3-pointers and a buzzer-beating layup to end the half-tied 36-36 with Arizona.
“Before I was trying to get my shot, now I’m showing that I have different aspects of my game. So just showing that and my teammates keep finding me and giving me the confidence, that really helped,” Conner said.
ASU did most of their damage at the line in the third quarter, while Arizona seemingly could not make a bucket and went on a three-and-a-half-minute scoring drought in the middle of the quarter.
Reese then made a layup that was quickly followed up by a layup from Conner, a steal from Koi Love and another layup from Reese. That tied the game 46-46 on a 6-0 scoring run in 46 seconds from Arizona.
Arizona took the lead on a Sam Thomas 3-pointer that gave Arizona a 51-49 lead heading into the fourth quarter.
Arizona’s bench helped extend their lead early in the fourth with baskets from Conner and Love. Arizona’s offense still didn’t seem as though it had found its rhythm as they had a five-minute scoring drought, but the defense was able to help keep ASU from scoring as well.
A lapse on defense let ASU cut the lead to 2 points on an unguarded layup late in the fourth quarter. ASU was able to tie the game but quickly lost the lead on a layup from Love that would be the game-sealing shot. Arizona then took control as ASU played the foul game and was unable to catch up to Arizona.
“I’ve said it since I’ve been here, I’m trying to win. I want to do whatever the team needs me to do to win, so we accomplished the mission tonight. Hopefully moving forward we can keep doing that,” Love said.
Reese led the team on scoring, putting up 17 points on 7-12 shooting and added five rebounds. Conner was the player of the game, putting up a career-high 16 points on 7-10 shooting and 2-4 from 3-point range. Love also had two big steals in crunch time while also adding 11 points on 5-7 shooting while grabbing six rebounds.
“We got it handed to us on Friday and ASU played so well, and I think just dominated every part of the game. We could never bounce back after we got punched in the face,” head coach Adia Barnes said. “So proud of the way that we responded and just found the way to win. It wasn’t the prettiest game. I thought we still made a lot of mistakes, but we still found a way and different people stepped up to get this win. So it was a good win for us.”
Arizona’s record now stands at 18-4 (8-4 in Pac-12 play) and will head on the road to play the University of Washington on Friday, Feb. 18 at 8 p.m. in Alaska Airlines Arena at HEC Edmundson Pavilion in Seattle.
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