After a disappointing end to the ‘24-25 regular season, the Gonzaga Women righted the ship yesterday evening against the UTSA Roadrunners with a 67-51 victory. The positive result means that the Bulldogs will face off against the #1 seeded Colorado Buffalos in the second round of the WBIT on Sunday for a match slated to tip-off at 12:00 PST.
Despite the 14-point win, the Zags exited the gait slowly and found themselves down by as much as six points on two different occasions in the first 7 or so minutes of the match. Some of this might’ve been the natural rust developed after an extended time away from the court, but I also think the Spokane fanbase did the team no favors with an official attendance of just 2,571, which is embarrassingly low compared to their season average of 5,174. However, across the next 3 minutes, the game script totally flipped as the Zags went on a 14-2 run that resulted in the first quarter ending 23-17.
This proved to be a pivotal moment as the Bulldogs would never trail again and the Runners could only cut their deficit to 6 points across the remainder of the match. The ESPN win probability graph is a must view because of its beauty:
As to be expected, Yvonne Ejim led the way with 24 points, 16 rebounds, 2 assists, 1 block, and, wait for it, SEVEN STEALS (!) in her 34 minutes. Speaking after the game, Ejim commented that “The start was very rocky, but you could see us in the first quarter really dig ourselves back and take the game back into our possession and never really have it go another way. That’s the best thing I saw, just the feeling of momentum and I saw it in everyone’s eyes. I felt it on defense.”
After an offensive explosion for a team-high 9 points in the first quarter, Maud Huijbens fell back down to earth, primarily due to foul trouble, but she still finished the game with a respectable 11 points, 3 rebounds, and 2 steals in her 25 minutes.
Allie Turner was uncharacteristically quiet throughout the opening 30 minutes as she didn’t score her first points until the third period, but came to life in the fourth as she ended the match with 13 points with 3 threes, 4 rebounds, 4 assists, 2 blocks, and just 2 turnovers. Those threes allowed Allie to surpass Brynna Maxwell’s season-high mark for made three points of 96 as she currently has 98 on the campaign. The fact that this true freshman can come in and exceed a Gonzaga record set by an outstanding shooter that was drafted into the WNBA and is currently playing overseas is absolutely remarkable.
As a team, the Bulldogs showed up last night.
They might’ve coughed up 16 turnovers, but that’s actually less than their season average of 17.8 entering the game, and managed to generate more opposition turnovers, 19, than their own for just the 5th time all season. That is an absolutely mind blowing statistic and should really indicate how much talent this team possess.
The defense did more than just generate turnovers as the Roadrunners scored about 15 points less than their season average, 7% less from 2-point range, 10% less from beyond the arc, and coughed up 3 more turnovers than their season average of 16. Fortier employed a lot of trap calls and this proved to be extremely effective at breaking UTSA’s rhythm, delaying their start of the half court offense, and the Zags looked hungry for more all game.
Jordyn Jenkins, the Roadrunners’ star player, ended up with 14 points, which isn’t too far off her season average of 18.8, but she did it with incredible inefficiency as she shot 4-13 from the field and needed those 4 made free throws to pad her scoring numbers.
Sydney Lowe, the team’s second leading scorer entering the match, ended up with a respectable 15 points, which is certainly higher than her 10.1 points per game in the regular season, but she too also needed a ton of shots, 12, to nail those baskets, 5 and depended on the foul line for her points.
In the post-game interviews, Lisa commended, “Our team played really, really well…I’ve just been so proud of them and what they’ve done and how they’ve transformed themselves as a group of basketball players throughout the season. It’s just fun and fitting that we could play better than we did the last time we were here.” Well said Coach. I just wish more fans were in attendance to watch these fireworks
Set your alarm for Sunday at 12pm PST and don’t party or mourn too hard based on the Men’s result against Houston the night so you can catch the matchup against Colorado on ESPN+
