Women’s basketball dominates Arizona Wildcats

By Jillian Arja in Front Page, Sports on Jan 21, 2013 19:39 / comments

The University of Colorado women’s basketball team came out ready to play Sunday afternoon. They dominated the Arizona Wildcats throughout the game, winning 79-36.

This was the largest margin for the Buffs in 18 years. They led at half by 28 (43-15), which tied their biggest halftime conference play high lead since 2003 against Kansas.

The Buffs are now 4-2 in the Pac-12 and 15-2 overall. Arizona moves to 3-3 in the conference and 11-6 overall. This win moves Colorado up to fourth in the Pac-12 but drops Arizona down to seventh.

Junior guard Brittany Wilson works to dribble past the Louisville Cardinal forward Shawnta’ Dyer in this file photo from Dec. 14, 2012. The Buffs defeated the Arizona Wildcats 79-36 Sunday afternoon in Boulder. (Amy Leder/CU Independent file)

Arizona Head Coach Niya Butts said her team did not play tough enough against CU.

“There’s no better way to say it, they beat us in every category on the stat sheet,” Butts said. “They played tougher and we weren’t physical … We didn’t battle.”

Colorado out-rebounded Arizona by a large margin, with 51 total (30 defensive, 21 offensive). Arizona was only able to get 26 off the glass (14 defensive, 12 offensive).

Arizona’s All Pac-12 Conference player, Davellyn Whyte, led her team with 11 points. Her teammate, Layana White added 9. With only three on their bench, the Wildcats had little support. Their bench contributed 11 to the team, while CU’s bench added 32.

Sophomore Lexy Kresl said one of the things they were trying to work on and succeeded at Sunday was using each member of their team.

“Not one person was trying to get their points or their steals,” Kresl said in a CUBuffs.com article. “It wasn’t about statistics, it was about playing together.”

Overall, Colorado had a field goal percentage of 50 and held the Wildcats to just 25 percent.

It was also a great game for senior Buff Chucky Jeffery. She scored 9 points, got 5 rebounds and had 6 assists. This made her the first Colorado player to obtain a career 400 assists, 800 rebounds and 1400 points.

CU Head coach Linda Lappe was proud of her team’s effort against Arizona.

“We made very few mental or physical errors in that game,” Lappe said to CUBuffs.com on Sunday. “It is pretty rare that you have both of those things happen on the same night. Tonight everything was clicking.”

The Buffs are away for the next four straight games. They will head to California first on Friday.

Statistics and quotes courtesy CUBuffs.com.

Contact CU Independent Staff Writer Jillian Arja at Jillian.arja@colorado.edu.