Junior guard Allison Greene led the Cougars with 40 points, seven rebounds, nine assists and eight steals in the final two games of the regular season, but the entire team stepped up in the two double-digit victories. Photo credit: Steven Mercado
Following tough back-to-back home losses that knocked it out of the race for the Pacific West Conference title, the Azusa Pacific women’s basketball team headed to northern California last week for its final two games of the regular season. Thursday, Feb. 27, the Cougars defeated PacWest champion Academy of Art by double-digits and Saturday, March 1, the Cougars dealt the same favor to Holy Names.
The Cougars won 82-66 over an Academy of Art team that clinched the PacWest championship after the Cougars’ previous game, a loss against Point Loma. Two monumental runs for Azusa Pacific gave them a commanding lead that never dwindled.
The first was a 19-6 spurt toward the end of the first half that gave the Cougars a 37-29 lead. A 24-9 run in the second half solidified the victory.
Leading the Cougars was junior guard Allison Greene with a spectacular performance. She scored a game-high 23 points, grabbed five rebounds, dished out five assists and snatched a game-high four steals.
Five of her teammates scored double figures, including junior forward Sendy Valles with 15 points, nine rebounds and five assists and sophomore forward Kelly Hardeman with 11 points, eight boards and two blocks. The other two to reach double digits were sophomore guard Sullivan Ziegler with 10 points and four rebounds and junior guard Katie Powell with 11 points, hitting 3-of-4 of her three-point attempts.
The Cougars held the Urban Knights to 32.4 percent shooting and out-rebounded them 47-40. They held Academy of Art sophomore guard Zoie Sheng to three-of-10 shooting, but she made 11 of her 13 free throws to lead her team in scoring with 17 points. The only other Urban Knight to score in double figures was sophomore forward Krystal Forthan, who scored 16 points on 7-of-17 shooting along with a game-high 14 boards.
Saturday night, Azusa Pacific closed the season on a high note, beating Holy Names on the latter’s senior night 72-58.
“To play them on their last game and their senior night, they were pretty emotional and pumped up. We talked about wanting to have the intensity we’re looking for to close out the regular season and be ready for playoffs,” head coach T.J. Hardeman said. “It was a tough game, but I thought we were able to dominate inside and get some easy buckets.”
The top performers for the final game of the regular season were Greene and Kelly Hardeman. Greene scored 17 points, four assists and once again, a game-high four steals while Hardeman scored 17 points and grabbed 10 rebounds for a double-double. The bench played a key factor in the win, scoring 21 points opposed to the Hawks’ five bench points. A mixture of well-balanced scoring and sharing the rock propelled the Cougars to victory in both of their final games of the regular season.
“It was a testament of us saying, ‘Hey, our goal is to be playing for a while longer, so let’s just sustain that hardened play,” coach Hardeman said. “On Thursday, we had 20 assists on [27 baskets] and [on Saturday], we had 17 assists off 27 baskets, so I was glad to see us finding each other, glad to see us making passes, getting good assists and setting each other up. It was good team basketball, and that’s what we talked about doing all year. It’s nice to see us doing the things we wanted to do at the end of the year.”
The Azusa Pacific women’s basketball team’s back-to-back wins to close the season earned the squad a first-round bye in the three-team NCCAA West Region tournament. APU faced Point Loma on Tuesday, March 4. After falling to the Sea Lions on Saturday, Feb. 22, Hardeman said before the game that it would be different than their game earlier this year.
“They’re a very good team, as we are. We played them last time and our focus was not where it needed to be,” Hardeman said. “I think we’re a lot more focused now as far as being aware of what we’re playing for and what our goals are. The goal at this point is to go back to the NCCAA [championship] and that’s what’s at stake here.”