Women fall in final road game

Utah State’s Devyn Christensen’s 26-point performance was too much for the Idaho women’s basketball team to handle in an 85-63 loss to the Aggies Saturday.
The Vandals (9-19, 4-8 WAC) hit the 20-turnover mark for the third straight game, and this time it led to 28 Utah State points. Turnovers have hurt Idaho all year and especially as of late. The Vandals will try to get back on the winning side this week when they play their final two regular season games against San Jose State Thursday and Hawaii Saturday.
Idaho coach Jon Newlee said turnovers were the difference in the game.
“Really, the turnovers are what hurt us,” Newlee said. “We didn’t play any transition defense and they just kind of took over. I thought our shot selection wasn’t great during their run. The combination of the two was a killer.”
Idaho came out firing in the first half and went up 5-0 early. The Vandals held onto the lead for the first 10 minutes of the game, but then Utah State (18-8, 9-3 WAC) came alive. The Aggies went on a 12-0 run midway through the first half and took a 39-33 lead into the locker room.
The second half was all Utah State. The Aggies went on a 12-2 run to begin the half, taking a commanding lead that they never gave up. Fifteen points was as close as Idaho got the rest of the contest.
Utah State put the game on cruise control and sailed to the one-sided victory.
“We went away from what was successful in the first half and I’m not sure why they decided not to stick with the plan,” Newlee said. “Once we started freelancing a little bit, we got in trouble.”
Idaho had a solid shooting night with a 40.1 field-goal percentage, but the Aggies countered by hitting 49 percent of their shots including more than half of their 3-point attempts.
Earlier in the season the Aggies pounded Idaho in the paint with 42 points down low. The Aggies continued to work Idaho underneath by scoring 28 in the key. Idaho was outrebounded 36-26 in the game.
Utah State had five players in double figures, led by Christensen’s 26 points. Idaho’s Alyssa Charlston led the Vandals with 17, while senior Keri Arendse tallied 14.
“They’re really talented offensively,” Newlee said. “They were getting contributions from players who don’t normally do that and if they can do that they’re going to be really hard to beat. We were really concentrating on a couple of their players and their other guys ended up having good nights.”
The Vandals are No. 6 in the WAC and are just two games behind San Jose State and Hawaii, both of which lost to Idaho earlier this year. The Vandals could still get into fourth if they win their remaining games and both teams lose the rest of theirs.
“I think these games are huge,” Newlee said. “Everyone’s battling for standings. I think there’s a whole litany of things that are important about these last two games.”
The Hawaii game Saturday will be senior night for Idaho. Seniors Keri Arendse, Adrie Shiels and Ganeaya Rogers will play their last game at 2 p.m. in the Cowan Spectrum.

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