Wyoming Advances to the WNIT Super 16
By Christian Lasher
After an early first-round exit from the Mountain West tournament, the Cowgirls from Wyoming came out swinging in their first game of the WNIT tournament against the University of Texas-San Antonio. The Roadrunners brought their 18-14 record into Laramie’s Arena-Auditorium Sunday and quickly ran into the buzzsaw known as the Cowgirls.
Playing like they had a chip on their shoulder after their loss in Las Vegas to Boise State, two early 3 pointers from Sophomore Guard Melene Petersen who ended with 24 points, and one from Junior Guard Emily Mellema (7 pts.) set the tone by giving the Cowgirls a early 11-4 lead.
Pedersen said, “It was great. Not often do we have such a good season and such a such a good first quarter…it set the tone for the rest of the game and I think it really build up the energy for the whole bench and it was just the what we needed to get back on track after the (Mountain West) tournament.”
Head coach Heather Ezell added, “We’ve been working on in practice of getting back to that winning feeling and it's been bottling up for a while and sitting around and waiting for this game. So it was kind of letting the cat out of the cage. The sense that they were ready to roll on both ends, too, not just on the offensive end which is where I thought we were really locked in.”
Wyoming kept up the intensity by inspired inside play from and a first quarter three- pointer from Senior Guard McKinley Dickerson from Lyman, Wyoming. She went on a 9-0 run herself to score her 1,002nd career point as a Cowgirl.
Dickerson on her career feat: “I was a little bit nervous, but I'm happy. I'm just happy that we finally put it all together. Really…It was good.” She ended the contest with 16 points.
Pedersen added, “She's so valuable for us and she's such a strong, smart player…we need on our team. I love playing with her and she's a key player for us.”
The Cowgirls took a 64-41 into the fourth quarter.
Despite a late game flurry by the Roadrunners cutting into the Wyoming lead, the Cowgirls hung on for the 80-64 win to move to 17-14 on the season.
UTSA was lead by Senior Forward Jordyn Jenkins. She finished with a game-high 28 points.
Ezell added, “We knew what she was going to be capable of. (In the first half) she got in a little bit of foul trouble. And then the second-half, you know, she started to heat up. We were able to close some gaps and whatnot. But I got to give a lot of credit to Tess (Barnes) and Madi (Symons) because they came in, you know…Tess might not score in the game, and might not show up in the stat sheet. What she did on Jenkins. She made her earn every one of those 28 points.”
Jenkin’s scoring picked up in the third quarter. She scored 18 points while only 2 other Roadrunners were in the scoring column with a collective 3 points.
The Roadrunners outscored Wyoming 21-19 in the 3rd quarter and 23-16 in the 4th.
Ezell added, “I just thought we kind of started settling for shots that we made in the first half. We started to take them early in the shot clock, especially in that zone. We still need to get some inside-outside touches. So we started to settle a little bit down there and you know, make a couple reversals.”
Playing in the third WNIT tournament in as many years, Wyoming says they are blessed to have home games.
Dickerson added, “You could feel the love and yeah, just looking around….you're just like, yep, we're in Wyoming. Like, you know, you're home and you know, you're with the best fans.”
Ezell on playing in the WNIT: “Yeah, just being able to play in postseason, it's a huge honor having the ability to keep competing with this group and especially for our freshmen to continue to get experience and everything like that…especially when we get to play at home in front of the the amazing fans that we have that come out and show out. I know our team still has the ultimate goal of playing in the NCAA Tournament, but any postseason right now is great for the experience.”
Wyoming’s experience continues this week, but he Cowgirls will have to wait to see when they will play their next game.
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