Much like last week’s game against Cal, the ASU women’s basketball team trailed early and struggled to pull even with UA.
But there were no late-game heroics for the Sun Devils in Tucson.
UA senior forward Ify Ibekwe had 22 points and 22 rebounds, and the Wildcats (14-9, 5-7 Pac-10) took over the last three minutes of the game to run away with a 73-61 win over ASU.
The Sun Devils (14-8, 6-6) were inconsistent all afternoon, and eventually paid for it down the stretch. It was ASU’s first loss to the Wildcats since 2005, which was especially tough to take, ASU redshirt senior guard Dymond Simon said.
“I’m kind of speechless right now, I think we all are,” Simon said. “It sucks to lose, especially to a team we’ve beat the last [six] years.”
Simon led the Sun Devils with 21 points, and senior forward Becca Tobin added 12 points and 10 rebounds, her first double-double of the season.
The Sun Devils had a decent shooting night, hitting 39.7 percent from the floor, and it should have been enough, ASU coach Charli Turner Thorne said.
“Sixty-one points should do it for us, it’s the bottom line” Turner Thorne said.
The only reason Turner Thorne could give for ASU’s play was the pressure the team was under.
“This is down the stretch, and if we want to get what we want, we’ve got to win,” she said. “I think we succumbed to the pressure today.
“We had a really good week of practice, and these kids care, and they worked hard. That’s the only explanation I have.”
The most obvious difference between yesterday’s game and ASU’s 75-43 victory on Jan. 16 was the play by Ibekwe. By halftime she had already secured her double-double, with 11 points and 10 rebounds, and would keep rolling in the second half.
“I knew I had to put in more effort tonight, and just go out there and give them my all,” Ibekwe said. “It was nothing different, just knowing that this was my last game against ASU at home.”
Part of the reason for Ibekwe’s big game, however, was the disappearance of ASU’s stifling defense, which has been a huge part of the team’s success so far this year.
“They did nothing that we did not prepare for,” Turner Thorne said. “We did play our defense. We did not take away the things that we practiced taking away.”
The Sun Devils got off to a solid start in the first half and held a three-point lead with 3:55 remaining. Right off the bat, ASU was getting the ball in to Tobin and the other forwards in the paint, but that faded away as the game went on.
A lightning-quick 8-0 UA run gave the Wildcats a halftime lead, although a last-second jumper by Simon cut that lead to one.
The second half started the same way the first half ended. The Wildcats quickly built up a seven-point lead in the first five minutes, but ASU pulled them back and went ahead briefly on a Simon three-pointer with 10:20 left.
That would be the last ASU lead, however, and although the Sun Devils would get within five points with 2:53 left, mistakes would cost ASU the comeback.
“It was just those lapses we had,” Simon said. “I think we had a couple turnovers, we fouled them a few times, and plays like that are just momentum for the other team. They definitely had that going for them tonight.”
The Sun Devils were only out-rebounded by two, but the boards were a big factor, Tobin said.
“We didn’t really have a good rebounding effort tonight,” Tobin said. “We kind of stood and watched, when we knew we needed to get second shots, on their zone especially.”
For now, ASU just has to move past this game and look forward to the rest of the road trip, Simon said.
“Every experience like this is a learning opportunity, and we just need to get back to Phoenix and just work on the things we need to work on to get ready for Washington,” Simon said.
Reach the reporter at egrasser@asu.edu
