The ASU women’s basketball team embarks on another road trip when they take on Washington and Washington State this weekend.
The Sun Devils’ flights to Washington State University and the University of Washington will be exceptionally long for the team, but redshirt junior forward Janae Fulcher said the team is going to use the down time to their advantage.
“It’s an all-day trip, so (we will) spend time on our scouting report, really knowing their personnel, maybe watching some extra film,” Fulcher said.
WSU comes into the game on a four-game losing streak.
However, the Cougars have lost three of their last four games by less than 10 points.
Senior guard Alex Earl said the Cougars’ current record is deceiving.
“Washington State’s good,” Earl said. “The games that they have lost have been within five, four. You have to go into (the game knowing) they are a good team and they, at any time, can beat any team.”
UW is coming off back-to-back losses against Stanford and Cal. The Huskies had a successful pre-season, but have yet to find their stride in the Pac-12, as they have only won two conference games.
The Huskies are known for their outside shooting abilities. They are tied with Stanford as the best 3-point shooting team in the conference at 34.3 percent.
Freshman guard Jazmine Davis has been one of the deadly outside threats for UW. She is currently hitting 33.3 percent of her shots from beyond the arc.
Coach Joseph Anders said the team has not changed up their schemes on defense to combat UW’s outside shooting because he is confident in the team’s defense.
“We will do what we do,” Anders said. “If you look at what we do, our perimeter defense has actually been pretty stellar all year. It will be another tough Pac-12 weekend for us on the road.”
At this point in the season, the Sun Devils are second in the Pac-12 in opponents scoring. However, they rank second to last in offensive scoring.
In the past two games, the Sun Devils’ offense has improved — ASU shot over 40 percent from the field in both games.
During a shooting drill in practice, Anders said the team got a little too excited on the offensive end. He stressed to his players that if they are calm and play relaxed, the buckets will come easier.
Earl said Anders’ advice really helps when ASU takes on a strong defensive team.
“In (the Utah) game we were kind of shook because they (were) playing about as good of defense as we do,” Earl said. “We need to slow down and make better decisions, get in the flow of things and not rush.”
Fulcher said the offensive production springs from the defensive side of the court.
“As the year goes on, our defense is our primary offense,” she said. “The harder we play defense, the easier it is for us to get easy buckets and the easier our offense flows.”
Reach the reporter at ehubbard@asu.edu
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