It’s become widespread for a women’s college basketball team to don pink uniforms once a season for its annual Women’s Basketball Coaches Association “Pink Zone” game that is designed to help raise money and awareness for breast cancer across the country.

But this season, ASU coach Charli Turner Thorne has decided to take the cause one step further.

For every ticket sold for Saturday’s Pink Zone game against UA, Turner Thorne will donate 50 cents to the Kay Yow/WCBA Cancer Fund.

“Hopefully, it will motivate people to maybe want to come out and come to the game,” Turner Thorne said. “This is a big game, [and] people do normally come out. I’m hoping to write a big check.”

The Pink Zone initiative was started in 2007 by the WCBA and is a global effort to raise awareness about the disease. The cause was greatly pushed by former NC State women’s basketball coach Kay Yow, who passed away in January 2009 after her third recurrence of breast cancer.

Turner Thorne now serves as the Vice President of the WCBA and got to know Yow through their involvement with the organization.

“She was such an ambassador and such a classy woman,” Turner Thorne said of Yow. “Because I got on the board of directors, I really got a lot of contact with her in the last few years. I think that makes it more special and it makes you want to do more. I should be doing something more than having my team in pink uniforms.”

Fans are encouraged to join the Sun Devils by wearing pink to Saturday’s game.

Watson questionable

The point guard situation is still very much up in the air for the Sun Devils, as junior Tenaya Watson remains questionable to play Saturday because of a foot injury.

Watson missed both of ASU’s games last week at Oregon State and Oregon.

If Watson is unable to play, the starting point guard duties will again fall to freshman Sabrina McKinney, who tallied eight assists and six turnovers during her two starts on the road last week.

“The thing you love about Sabrina is that you know that nothing’s going to bother her,” Turner Thorne said. “Sometimes I think you can look at her and be like, ‘She needs to show more emotion.’ She’s got her game face, and she’s very steady. I thought she really grew [last week], and I thought she wasn’t fazed at all.”

Senior Danielle Orsillo also spent time at the point for the first time of her ASU career during a weekend where she set a new career-high in points in back-to-back games. She scored 26 points against OSU and then racked up 29 in the Sun Devils’ loss to UO.

“I just was taking [the ball] aggressively to the rim, and that’s part of the game I’ve really worked on,” Orsillo said. “I did like [playing point guard] — it was surprising. It’s a little tiring, because it’s a different kind of conditioning. I’m used to coming off of screens and running up the court forward. This was more like explosive [and then] slow down.”

Crashing the glass

It was no secret that rebounding has been the focus of practice this week after the Sun Devils allowed 22 offensive boards against UO.

“If we had tails, we’d be rebounding them off,” Orsillo said. “I just think it was effort [against UO] — we weren’t ready for them to shoot. We just had a complete letdown, and it wasn’t a good game to have one.”

The Sun Devils are currently out-rebounding their opponents by 6.6 boards per game, which ranks third in the Pac-10.

Home sweet home?

ASU’s contest against UA starts the Sun Devils’ final homestand of the season, with Stanford and California visiting Tempe next week.

But the Sun Devils have not done as well at protecting their home court this season compared to recent years.

ASU came into this year’s Pac-10 season having won 82 percent of its conference games (59-13) since 2005-06, but the Sun Devils have already lost three Pac-10 games at home this season and needed overtime to defeat Washington earlier this month.

“I did challenge our team in the locker room that we really show up and represent at home,” Turner Thorne said during her postgame radio interview following the UO game. “This young team has been so tough on the road and played such great basketball. Every game on the road they’ve done a great job, and then we come home and we relax.”

Reach the reporter at gmizell@asu.edu