VANCOUVER – The UBC Thunderbirds suffered a tough loss at home Friday night against the Fraser Valley Cascades. The two teams went toe-to-toe in the first half, but the Cascades dominated in the second, outscoring the Thunderbirds 45-19 on route to a 76-48 victory.
BOX SCORE
The changing point in the game came when Cascades guard Aieisha Luyken (Mission, BC) hit a long-range buzzer beater at the end of the first half. Up until that point, the Thunderbirds had been holding their own with solid defensive play, but the Cascades clearly took control of the momentum. They came back out in the third quarter and immediately went on a run. They never let up and got things done at both ends to cruise on to their fifth win to start this season.
WBB: T-Birds v. UFV (Nov. 16, 2012) Gallery
Cascades guard Sarah Wierks (Chilliwack, BC) finished with a game-high 16 points. Her teammates Luyken, Nicole Wierks (Chilliwack, BC) and Courtney Bartel (Chilliwack, BC) added 15, 14, and 13 respectively.
Bright spots for UBC were
Kris Young (North Vancouver, BC) with 14 points and
Alyssa Binns (Port Moody, BC) with 13. Binns was the only Thunderbird to shoot 50% from the floor. She smoothly hit all three of her free throws as well after taking a hard foul to her injured hand on a shot from behind the arch in the second quarter. Her team as whole finished at just under 30% from the field on the night, compared to 46% for the Cascades.
“I thought we held tough in the first half. We defended and competed well, but we weren't able to sustain it in the second half obviously,” said UBC head coach
Deb Huband. “Giving up those couple of threes late in the second quarter allowed them to get a little bit of momentum going into the half, and then the third quarter was a tough quarter. We had trouble scoring and trouble responding. The game changed with our inability to get stops and the way we struggled offensively,” she added.
Their defensive play in the first half was a marked improvement from last weekend, but UBC seemed to come unravelled and looked more and more disorganized as the game went on. They let up 24 turnovers and were outscored 36-6 in the paint, whereas the Cascades continued their aggressive play and moved the ball well, getting quality looks on seemingly every possession.
“They're a very good team. Many of them have played together now for three or four years, and you can tell by the way they share the ball, move the ball, how they execute offensively. It was very smooth and they were able to get quality looks for themselves on most possessions,” Huband commented on the Cascades. She added that the Thunderbirds “haven't developed that chemistry on the floor yet. We don't have people on the floor that are comfortable in pressure situations yet, and you can see that with the turnovers and unforced errors.”
The Cascades are one of the best defensive teams in Canada West, so UBC will need to come back out tomorrow night and find a way to get things going offensively, and not wait until late in the shot clock to do so. “We need some of our leaders to step up on the court and off the court. We struggled and weren't able to establish an inside game,” said Huband.
“Obviously this is a tough one to bounce back from. We've got a lot of young kids that have to step up, but that's our reality so it needs to get done. Hopefully everybody will be able to learn a bit and reflect and come ready to go at it tomorrow.”
The win moves UFV's perfect record to 5-0 this season, while UBC drops to 4-1. Tip-off for round two is set for 5 p.m. Saturday night at War Memorial Gym.
