VANCOUVER – A trio of players scored 13 points each to lead the UBC Thunderbirds women's basketball team to a 79-57 win over the Toronto Varsity Blues at the University of Alberta HoopFest tournament in Edmonton on Saturday.
Leigh Stansfield (4th, Victoria, BC),
Kris Young (2nd, North Vancouver, BC) and
Alex Vieweg (5th, North Vancouver, BC) all recorded 13 points to power a balanced UBC offensive attack. Stansfield also recorded eight rebounds.
“We had another strong, overall team performance today,” said UBC head coach
Deb Huband. “We had a chance to get everybody on the floor and see them compete.”
The Thunderbirds built up a 37-23 halftime lead against a Toronto team that finished sixth at the CIS Championships last season.
The lead was cut slightly in the third before UBC pulled away with a strong 23-14 finish in the fourth quarter.
“Our defence was pretty strong,” said Huband after the game. “It caused a lot of problems for our opponents so that's encouraging to see. We spend a lot of time building our team defence and believe that's a big factor in our future success so it's really encouraging to see us in a position where we held them to 11, 12 and 14 points in three of the four quarters.”
The Thunderbirds' defence also held Toronto to 33% shooting. UBC also won the battle under the boards, outrebounding the Varsity Blues 40-25.
UBC's bench players outscored their counterparts from Toronto by a count of 30-7.
“We were really sparked by
Chloee St. Amour off the bench for the second straight night,” said Huband. “
Cassandra Knievel had her first CIS start and did some great things, going 2 for 3 from the three-point line.”
Huband's crew also got an unexpected spark from UBC's football team. After they beat the Alberta Golden Bears 39-22, the team's players, coaches and staff attended the UBC basketball game and gave the T-Birds a bit of a home court advantage in an opposing venue.
The Thunderbirds will finish the three-day HoopFest tournament on Sunday with a 12:00 p.m. game against the Wilfrid Laurier Golden Hawks from Waterloo, Ontario.
