For the ASU women’s basketball team, the future might officially be now.
Looking to spark a squad that had lost three games in a row to find itself on the outside of the NCAA Tournament field, ASU coach Charli Turner Thorne opted to start five freshmen — post players Janae Fulcher and Joy Burke and guards Deja Mann, Sabrina McKinney and Haley Parsons — for the Sun Devils’ first-round Women’s National Invitation Tournament contest against New Mexico State.
It worked.
The tandem of first-year players led the charge as the Sun Devils cruised past the Aggies 84-61 Wednesday night at Wells Fargo Arena in one of their most productive offensive games of the season.
“The reason that those five started is they just had the best chemistry [in practice],” Turner Thorne said. “They earned it. I certainly don’t want anybody thinking I’m trying to make a point. Obviously, the players that did not start have done great things for us this year. Sometimes, that’s really good to take the pressure off of them, because there’s been some players that I think have been playing a little bit pressed and putting pressure on themselves.”
A slew of career marks were set by the freshmen, including in scoring by Fulcher (18 points) and Burke (14 points). Burke also had career-bests in rebounds (six) and blocked shots (three), while McKinney also set a new personal mark with six rebounds and tied her career-high with four steals in addition to her six points and five assists.
“[For] us freshmen, it was different, [because] we were kind of on the other side of the spectrum,” Fulcher said. “We are kind of the future. The freshman class is going to be where [seniors Kayli Murphy and Danielle Orsillo are one day], so I guess we had our chance to learn tonight how it felt to be in their position.”
The scoring output was also a season-high for a Sun Devil team that has had its fair share of offensive struggles all season long.
“I’m just very excited that we put two halves together [and] that we scored points,” Turner Thorne said. “It’s been a while since we put up some big numbers.”
The Sun Devils (18-13) never trailed in the game and were only briefly threatened by the Aggies (18-14) in the first half when a jumper by junior guard Jasmine Lowe cut ASU’s lead to 22-19 at the 8:21 mark.
But ASU answered when a layup by Burke ignited a 6-0 spurt to extend that advantage back up to 28-19 with 6:21 left before the break, and the Sun Devils later closed the half on a 10-5 run to take a 45-29 lead into the locker room and set a new season mark for most points in a half.
“Our defense really, really picked up,” McKinney said. “That helped us get out in transition [and] helped us score a lot more points.”
It was more of the same in the second half, as the Sun Devils’ lead grew to 51-31 on back-to-back fastbreak layups by Burke early in the period and then ballooned to a game-high 33 points when an old-fashioned 3-point play by junior guard Tenaya Watson capped a 19-0 run midway through the frame that made the score 81-48 with 6:51 remaining.
“As the first half wore on and [in] the second half, I thought we just slowed down and just relaxed and finished like we can finish,” Turner Thorne said. “I thought we were aggressive. We obviously felt like ‘OK, you can’t guard us,’ and we took it at them and got to the free throw line. I do feel like our chemistry was as good as it’s been.”
As a team, ASU out-rebounded NMSU 49-33 and forced 22 Aggie turnovers. The Sun Devils also had a 46-16 edge in bench points, mostly because of the changes to the starting lineup.
Orsillo, who suffered a concussion last Friday against California and played just 17 minutes, finished with 12 points, while Tobin scored 13 points and pulled down four rebounds.
Lowe led all scorers with 20 points for NMSU and added six steals, and junior guard Danisha Corbett chipped in with 12 points.
ASU will next host the winner of Thursday’s game between Pepperdine and BYU in the second round on Tuesday or Wednesday.
“Hopefully, we can get on a roll and learn how to win to March, because that’s sort of what we’ve been challenging ourselves with,” Turner Thorne said. “We’ve got to figure out this teamwork and toughness and what it takes to play championship basketball.”
Reach the reporter at gina.mizell@asu.edu