Clutch free throws help USU Women win season opener

Photo by Robert K. Scott

LOGAN – Utah State was up 79-72 with under 90 seconds in the game before Sarah McGinley hit back-to-back threes for Westminster College to pull it to 79-78 with 31 seconds left. However, Kaylin Randhawa was a perfect 4-4 from the the free throw line over the last 26 seconds to seal the 83-78 win for Utah State. Coach Kayla Ard opened her second season with a win.

It was a back and forth game with Westminster leading 41-39 at half before starting the third on an 8-4 run to go up 49-43. Griffin point guard Ashley Greenwood scored four of those points on her way to a game high 28 points. After an Aggie timeout, Olivia Wikstrom guarded Greenwood and held her to two points the rest of the quarter as Adryana Quezada fueled an 8-2 run to tie the game up at 56 all. The Griffins only led the game one more time.

Quezada had eight points and nine rebounds at half but finished with a 16 point, 13 rebound double double. Randhawa also had 16. E’Lease Stafford had 14, including the three pointer that put the Aggies up seven. Wikstrom finished with 12 points and Laci Hawthorne was also in double figures with 11 points. No Utah State player was in double figures at half time.

Utah State shot 13-40 from the field at the half (32.5%) before opening it up on the second half, shooting 15-30. The two big differences were the Aggie trips to the line in the second half and three point shooting. At the break they were 8-11 before going 10-17 in the second half, 8-12 in the final quarter. Utah State finished 18-28 to Westminster’s 8-13 from the charity stripe and 9-19 from deep to the Griffin’s 6-23.

Greenwood led all scorers with 28 points, finishing 13-16 from the field. McGinley had 18 points and Hunter Krebs, the Skyview grad, had 12 for there double figure scorers. Westminster fought hard in the paint, only losing the rebound battle 43-41 and scoring 46 in the paint to Utah State’s 32, but the Aggies had 20 offensive rebounds and scored 22 second chance points to the Griffin’s ten. Utah State also got 32 points from their bench to Westminster’s 11 as the Griffin’s bench only played 36 minutes. Meagen Mendazona was the big spark for the Aggies, finishing with six points, four assists, five rebounds and three steals.

Senior guard and captain Emmie Harris only played eight minutes in the game, no time in the second half, after taking a hard fall in the second quarter. Quezada was also lumbering as the game ended. That left the Aggies with essentially a seven player rotation as Kinley Falslev and Taylor Franson combined for under five total minutes, after going ten deep in the exhibition against Fort Lewis College.

The Aggies will look for their second win as they host Cal-State Fullerton at 2 p.m. on Saturday at the Spectrum.

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