Sometimes a team can use a huge game from a player to spark a rout against a tough opponent. On Tuesday night, the ASU women’s basketball team had two performances to choose from.
Senior guard Tenaya Watson had a career-high 25 points, Dymond Simon had 24 points and a career-high seven assists, and the Sun Devils (8-2) ran over No. 16 DePaul (13-2), 79-66, in front of a loud crowd at Wells Fargo Arena.
After the game, Watson said it wasn’t anything special that led to the explosion on offense.
“I just played,” Watson said. “I got hot. I just kept shooting. I could drive so I drove. And I just did what I could to help the team.”
Simon’s 24 points tied her career high, set against Washington State in 2007.
“We definitely set the tone tonight,” Simon said. “We got our fast breaks going and [Watson] was hitting the shots from the outside. We were moving the ball really well tonight.”
The ball movement was a good sign for a team that hasn’t played together for very long, ASU coach Charli Turner Thorne said.
“I’m just really happy that our team is figuring things out and really starting to see and believe in how good they can be,” Turner Thorne said. “This win reminded me of our wins here in our best years at ASU.”
ASU also played a complete game on defense, never letting up and hassling DePaul for the entire game.
“I feel that we should do that every time, now that we know that we can do it,” Watson said. “We have that defense, and we just need to get into character and just keep playing, regardless of what the score is.”
The win was also the first against a ranked team for ASU this season, after tough losses to Tennessee and Florida State.
“It means a lot,” Simon said. “It’s been a while since we’ve actually beat a ranked team, and I think tonight was definitely a great start.
The Sun Devils opened with the first basket of the game, but then allowed DePaul to control most of the first half.
The Blue Demons managed to build an eight-point lead with eight minutes left in the half, but ASU’s solid rebounding kept DePaul from pulling away, and a quick offensive burst by Watson and sophomore center Joy Burke at the end of the half tied the score at 33.
The Sun Devils came out a little slow in the second half, but with roughly 15 minutes left, DePaul started to wear down, and Simon and Watson took over. The Blue Demons didn’t have an answer for Watson’s drives into the lane, and with both players hot, shots started to fall for the rest of the team.
A 9-0 ASU run with eight minutes left was enough to put DePaul down by 14 and put the game out of reach. The end of the half got a little ugly, with 12 fouls called in the last five minutes.
The Sun Devils finished with 46 team rebounds to DePaul’s 32, and held the Blue Demons to just 8 offensive rebounds.
“This is the first game in a while that we’ve controlled the boards, and that was the other challenge going into this game,” Turner Thorne said. “I though that was a huge highlight and a big reason for our win.”
Watson also played a career-high 34 minutes, and Turner Thorne said she wasn’t too surprised that Watson had the game she did.
“I was expecting a good game from her,” Turner Thorne said. “She had that aura about her, and she was shooting the ball well yesterday and today. Tenaya’s just a warrior though, and she does so many things that don’t show up on the stat sheet.”
Reach the reporter at egrasser@asu.edu
