Weber State University Athletics
Weber State University
Brigham Young
Wildcats Knock Off BYU 65-54
12/12/2007 7:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Ogden, UT ? The second highest crowd in Weber State history saw the Weber State women's basketball team beat the BYU Cougars 65-54 Wednesday afternoon at the Dee Events Center. The crowd of 1,921 people included over 1,500 students from local elementary and middle schools who attended the 12:00 p.m. game as part of Field Trip Day.
On the court the Wildcats earned their first win over BYU since December 1994, snapping a ten-game losing streak to the Cougars. It was just the eighth win over BYU in school history. WSU won its fourth straight game and improved to 5-3 on the season.
“This was a great win for our school and our university,” said WSU head coach Carla Taylor. “The crowd was awesome and really gave us a lift. We appreciate their support and we're glad they came out and watched us play.”
WSU senior point guard Ahkiah Hunter scored a career-high 25 points to lead the Wildcats to the win. Hunter was 10-17 from the field in the game and also had five rebounds and three assists. Sophomore Ali Thorderson came off the bench for a career-high 16 points on 5-7 shooting. Senior Sara Tuomi struggled from the field, shooting just 1-11, but she was 12-12 from the free throw line to post 14 points. She also pulled down seven rebounds.
BYU out shot Weber State 44 percent to 40 percent but the Cougars posted 20 turnovers compared to just 12 for the Wildcats. WSU is 5-0 this season when committing fewer turnovers than their opponents and 0-3 when they have more turnovers.
Weber State held a 25-21 lead at halftime but the ?Cats came out with 40 points in the second half, the second most points in a half this season. BYU took a four point lead at 39-35 with 11:24 to play but the ?Cats bounced back to tie the game at 39-39 with 9:54 remaining. With WSU leading 46-43 with 6:00 to play, the ?Cats went on an 11-3 run and took their largest lead of the game of 11 points with just over 4:00 to play. Hunter had two three-pointers in that stretch. From there the Cougars went on an 8-0 run to cut the lead to three points with 1:24 to play but the ?Cats went a perfect 8-8 from the free throw line over the last 1:10 of the game to seal the victory. WSU ended the night 18-20 from the foul line.
“We didn't shoot well but we played well on the defensive end and that was our focus heading into the game,” Taylor said. “We had some players really step up and perform well and it was a good team effort.”
Freshman Karlee Weight had career-highs of six points and eight rebounds for Weber State. Mindy Nielson led BYU with 15 points off the bench.
The Wildcats, now 5-3 on the season, will now head out for four straight road games beginning Monday at UC Irvine. WSU will not play at home until January 5, 2008 which is also the first Big Sky Conference game when they host Northern Colorado.
