TEMPE, Ariz. – The Arizona State women's basketball team used a strong second half to propel its way to a 77-51 win over Washington State on Sunday.
Led by Courtney Ekmark's game-high 18 points and Kianna Ibis' 16 points, the Sun Devils won their third straight game and improved to 12-1 at home.
Jamie Ruden (12 points), Robbi Ryan (10 points) and Reili Richardson (10 points) also scored in double figures for the Sun Devils (17-7, 8-4 Pac-12), who are now tied for fourth place with No. 16 Oregon State (17-6, 8-4 Pac-12) in the Pac-12 standings.
Charnea Johnson-Chapman racked up a team-high nine rebounds as the Sun Devils outrebounded the Cougars by 26 (49-23). Also posting seven or more rebounds for ASU were Ryan (eight), Ibis (seven) and Sophia Elenga (seven). ASU also outscored Washington State in the paint by 18 points (36-18).
"Our biggest goal in this game was to have a great rebounding effort, and bottom line, if we limit Washington State, a great offensive rebounding team, to one shot and we get second shots we felt like we would win," ASU head coach Charli Turner Thorne said. "We were getting our second shots in the first half, but we kind of wore them down and did a great job. I thought it was a great team win, we executed defensively what we wanted to do and obviously really got going offensively in the second half and in the first half we got good looks, we just didn't quite finish them and we didn't get second shots.
"I feel really good about our team right now, how much they're jelling as a team and just growing in their toughness in terms of when they need to make plays and just pushing, not taking possessions off. I feel like we did a good job with that today. And you know Washington State, this is a team that was one possession with USC, one possession with UCLA...They're a good team, they have good talent. I felt like this was a huge win for us."
In the first half, both teams started off slow and could not separate from each other. The lead changed nine times until the Sun Devils capitalized on a scoring drought by the Cougars with a 6-0 run – jumper by Ibis, layup by Ryan and two free throws by Ekmark – to end the half.
Arizona State started the second half with a 7-0 run to double its halftime lead after the second of back-to-back jumpers by Ibis put ASU up 35-21. ASU ended the third quarter up 49-35. The Sun Devils' lead eventually ballooned to 26 points after Ruden hit a jumper with 1:54 left in the game.
After making only 35 percent of their shots in the first half, the Sun Devils connected on 65.5 percent of their shots in the second half enabling them to outscore the Cougars 49-26 over the final 20 minutes. ASU ended the game on a hot streak, hitting nine of their last 10 shots. In the fourth quarter the Sun Devils would end the weekend the same way they started it in the first quarter of their win over Washington on Friday: by hitting 83 percent (10-12) of their field goals.
The Sun Devils will take their last out-of-state road trip of the regular season later this week when they travel to Los Angeles for games at USC (Friday at 7 p.m. PT/8 p.m. MT - live stream on http://pac-12.com/live/usc-2) and at No. 9 UCLA (Sunday at 1 p.m. PT/2 p.m. MT - Pac-12 Network). Both games can also be heard on NBC Sports Radio AM 1060.
Led by Courtney Ekmark's game-high 18 points and Kianna Ibis' 16 points, the Sun Devils won their third straight game and improved to 12-1 at home.
Jamie Ruden (12 points), Robbi Ryan (10 points) and Reili Richardson (10 points) also scored in double figures for the Sun Devils (17-7, 8-4 Pac-12), who are now tied for fourth place with No. 16 Oregon State (17-6, 8-4 Pac-12) in the Pac-12 standings.
Charnea Johnson-Chapman racked up a team-high nine rebounds as the Sun Devils outrebounded the Cougars by 26 (49-23). Also posting seven or more rebounds for ASU were Ryan (eight), Ibis (seven) and Sophia Elenga (seven). ASU also outscored Washington State in the paint by 18 points (36-18).
"Our biggest goal in this game was to have a great rebounding effort, and bottom line, if we limit Washington State, a great offensive rebounding team, to one shot and we get second shots we felt like we would win," ASU head coach Charli Turner Thorne said. "We were getting our second shots in the first half, but we kind of wore them down and did a great job. I thought it was a great team win, we executed defensively what we wanted to do and obviously really got going offensively in the second half and in the first half we got good looks, we just didn't quite finish them and we didn't get second shots.
"I feel really good about our team right now, how much they're jelling as a team and just growing in their toughness in terms of when they need to make plays and just pushing, not taking possessions off. I feel like we did a good job with that today. And you know Washington State, this is a team that was one possession with USC, one possession with UCLA...They're a good team, they have good talent. I felt like this was a huge win for us."
In the first half, both teams started off slow and could not separate from each other. The lead changed nine times until the Sun Devils capitalized on a scoring drought by the Cougars with a 6-0 run – jumper by Ibis, layup by Ryan and two free throws by Ekmark – to end the half.
Arizona State started the second half with a 7-0 run to double its halftime lead after the second of back-to-back jumpers by Ibis put ASU up 35-21. ASU ended the third quarter up 49-35. The Sun Devils' lead eventually ballooned to 26 points after Ruden hit a jumper with 1:54 left in the game.
After making only 35 percent of their shots in the first half, the Sun Devils connected on 65.5 percent of their shots in the second half enabling them to outscore the Cougars 49-26 over the final 20 minutes. ASU ended the game on a hot streak, hitting nine of their last 10 shots. In the fourth quarter the Sun Devils would end the weekend the same way they started it in the first quarter of their win over Washington on Friday: by hitting 83 percent (10-12) of their field goals.
The Sun Devils will take their last out-of-state road trip of the regular season later this week when they travel to Los Angeles for games at USC (Friday at 7 p.m. PT/8 p.m. MT - live stream on http://pac-12.com/live/usc-2) and at No. 9 UCLA (Sunday at 1 p.m. PT/2 p.m. MT - Pac-12 Network). Both games can also be heard on NBC Sports Radio AM 1060.