The UBC Thunderbirds cruised to a weekend sweep over the Lethbridge Pronghorns with an 82-66 victory at home. The T-Birds won the game off the back of their stifling defence: they held the Pronghorns to just 39 points through the first three quarters and under 30% shooting from the field on the night.
Their dominance on that end of the court made up for some struggles at times on the offensive end as UBC committed 24 turnovers. After the win Thunderbirds head coach
Kevin Hanson highlighted how he still feels there is room for improvement for his team.
"We tried to guard a little bit differently," said Hanson. "We're still young, we're still trying to get used to playing with each other so hopefully we can clean things up a little more."
James Woods led the way for UBC once again with 18 points, 9 rebounds and 4 assists, while
Brian Wallack nearly matched him with 17 points and 9 rebounds.
Tobi Akinkunmi was strong off the bench with 10 points, 5 rebounds and 3 blocks.
Kymani Pollard led the Pronghorns in scoring with 24 points and 4 rebounds while Shae Gibb added 16 points and 3 steals.
Woods got the T-Birds off to a fast start, scoring 10 points in the first seven minutes to put UBC up 19-10. The Thunderbirds put pressure on the Lethbridge defence and earned eight free throw attempts in the opening quarter, which ended 25-12 in favour of the hosts.
The Thunderbirds struggled with turnovers early in the 2
nd, but the defence continued to stand tall to maintain the lead. A
Nikola Guzina block led to a fastbreak finished by an
Arnaud Konan jumper that put UBC up 36-23 as they continued to attack the basket.
The T-Birds closed the half strong with a run capped off by a Woods step-back three-pointer with just four seconds left to make it 46-28. UBC had four blocks in the half, two each from Guzina and Akinkunmi.
The Pronghorns made a push to begin the third with five straight points, but the Thunderbirds again had the answer with a run keyed by threes from
Adam Olsen and
Toni Maric off the bench.
Wallack was key in the third frame with eight points and five boards, and the T-Birds ended the quarter up 64-39 with their biggest lead of the night.
Lethbridge again made a brief push to begin the final frame with a 12-5 run, but that's as close as they would get as UBC cruised to victory.
Micah Jessie put a cap on the win with a chase-down block in the final few seconds and the final score stood at 82-66.
The Thunderbirds again played a deep rotation with 11 different players seeing the court, 10 of them playing at least 12 minutes.
"We are so deep you're trying to find guys that play with each other and get reads with each other," added Hanson. "It's going to be a work in progress…but we're really happy with the crew we got and we're going to continue to build."
UBC now heads out on the road for their next five games. It's a road-heavy schedule to begin the season as they will only have one more home game before winter break.
First on the docket is a trip to Winnipeg to take on the Wesmen next weekend, November 10
th and 11
th. That lone remaining home game this fall is on November 25
th against Victoria in War Memorial Gym.
