The Cowgirls Finish With a Third Straight Win
The Wyoming Cowgirls wrapped up a second place finish in the Mountain West with a 68-59 victory at San Jose State last Friday night.
With the win, UW reached 13 conference wins for the first time in program history.
Wyoming head coach Joe Legerski said in a release from the university,
“It was a really good team effort. We got off to a good start, then went in to a little bit of a lull after Clara (Tapia) got into foul trouble, and she was our leader out there on the court. We kept battling, and I thought we got back in to it in the third quarter. San José State throws one in from half court to take the momentum back and we knew we had to reach down again and fight back. What we ended up talking about was after three we were down one, at the half we were down four, so I told the team we were winning. We came out in the fourth quarter, stayed aggressive. It was difficult tonight. They press you 94-feet, trap you and you have to make good decisions with the ball.”
Five Cowgirls finished in double figures. Hailey Ligocki scored 14 points with five assists. Natalie Baker added a double-double with 13 points and season-high 14 rebounds. Bailee Cotton added her first career double-double thanks to 11 points and a career-best 11 rebounds. Taylor Rusk and Clara Tapia added 11 and 10 points, respectively.
A 13-4 run at the start of the fourth quarter proved to be the difference. It put UW in front 61-53, and San Jose State never got closer than six the rest of the game.
Wyoming (21-8, 13-5) shot nearly 53 percent from the field. They out-rebounded the Spartans 42-30 and finished with 32 points in the paint. The Cowgirls nearly cost themselves the game with 18 turnovers.
San Jose State (10-20, 7-11) were held under 36 percent shooting in the game. Dezz Ramos led the Spartans with 22 points. They scored 18 points off Wyoming’s turnovers.
With the victory, the Cowgirls clinched the second seed in the Mountain West Championship tournament in Las Vegas. Wyoming will face the winner of Fresno State-Nevada on Tuesday at 7 p.m., Mountain Time.