SPOKANE — Walla Walla fell behind 19-2 in the early minutes of Wednesday’s Northwest Athletic Conference East Region women’s basketball opener here Wednesday night.
And even though the Warriors fought back to within a single point in the third quarter, the comeback was of little solace to coach Bobbi Hazeltine following her team’s 63-53 loss to Spokane.
“We just made a lot of young mistakes that I hadn’t seen us make this year,” Hazeltine said. “You can’t go on the road against one of the best teams in the NWAC, if not the best, and get down 19-2.
“Our transition defense was really poor the whole game and particularly in the beginning. Spokane is more of a half-court team, but they were able to dominate the boards and run on us. And (because of) our lack of communication, we didn’t stop the ball.
“There were a lot of mistakes you don’t necessarily see college basketball players make, It was really baffling.”
Bri King scored 17 points Katlyn Summers Ward and Molly Webster added 14 points each to lead the Sasquatch. And Ward, who also pulled down a game-high 12 rebounds, was particularly effective by making six of her nine shots from the floor.
“Their girl in the middle just dominated us,” Hazeltine said of Ward, a 6-foot freshman from Priest River, Idaho. “They got a lot of offensive rebounds, and on defensive rebounds they ran on us.”
Spokane outrebounded Walla Walla 45-38. Sophomore Kate Ferenz led the Warriors with six rebounds.
The Sasquatch also did a good job defensively against Ferenz and freshman Cierra Jo McKeown, the team’s two best 3-point shooters. McKeown made 1-of-7 shots from 3-point distance and finished with nine points, Ferenz was 1-of-6 and totaled eight points.
“Spokane did a great job of finding Cierra Jo and Kate, knowing where they were all night,” Hazeltine said. “They mirrored them. And when they did get an open shot, they rushed it.”
The one bright spot for WWCC was freshman point guard Jade Skidmore, who led the way with 17 points on 8-for-16 shooting from the floor.
“Jade did an outstanding job with that little 10-foot jump shot,” Hazeltine said of Skidmore. “She was all over the place. But you have to have other kids pick up the slack, and we didn’t get anything inside or from our guards who weren’t being chased all night. We need a little more balance.”
The Warriors saw their season record slip to 7-3 while the Sasquatch improved to 10-2. Spokane travels to Treasure Valley Saturday for an East Region counter but the Warriors are idle until next Wednesday when they entertain Wenatchee in the Dietrich Dome.
Hazeltine is not pleased with the bye.
“I would much prefer to jump back in and play Saturday,” Hazeltine said. “I don’t like the bye at this time, but that’s the way it is.”
However, the extra practice time will give the Warriors an opportunity to work on their shortcomings.
“It’s all fixable,” Hazeltine said. “But it is frustrating.”
