After two wins in Hawaii, the Cougars finish the 2017-18 regular season as PacWest champions
The APU women’s basketball team poses for a picture after winning the 2017-18 PacWest Conference. Courtesy of APU Sports Information.
After ending their regular season with two more wins, the 19th-ranked Cougars finish the 2017-18 season with a phenomenal record of 27-3, and 18-2 in the PacWest Conference. The Cougars concluded their regular season in Hawaii, taking out Hawaii Pacific and Chaminade.
On Thursday, the team faced their biggest game of the season yet – a rematch with Hawaii Pacific, who held first place in the PacWest and had beaten APU at home earlier in the season. The Cougars were looking for payback, and that’s exactly what they dished out, defeating the No. 23-ranked Sharks 81-63.
“It was awesome. Great all-around team win. We were well prepared and ready to go. Defensively we did a good job of making them shoot tough shots. We made them really earn any shots they got,” head coach T.J. Hardeman said after the game. “In the first half we got into a bit of foul trouble and our bench did an outstanding job of providing good energy. A sign of a good team is being able to look to your bench and keeping a high level of play going.”
In the game, senior guard Abbigail Goodsell led the team with 30 points and six assists on the night, while senior forward Gabrielle Kaiser scored 13 points and grabbed nine rebounds. Kaiser’s presence was something that APU didn’t have in their first matchup against HPU, as she was out with an injury at the time. Sophomore Savanna Hanson was another top performer, scoring 17 points and grabbing eight rebounds.
The overall team effort led to APU having a 53-39 rebounding edge, and put the Cougars in first-place of the PacWest. The win also snapped a three-game losing streak to HPU, and broke HPU’s 19-game win streak.
On Saturday, the Cougars would close out the regular season against Chaminade, where they would take care of business, defeating the Silverswords 86-68 and claiming the 2017-18 PacWest Conference Championship title. With the win, the Cougars ended their regular season on a nine-game winning streak, their longest of the season, and a winning percentage of .900, one of the best in APU school history.
Both Goodsell and Kaiser were the anchors for their team again, as Goodsell led the team with 27 points and Kaiser was second with 20 points.
“Going into that HPU game, everyone was super focused and was on top of what we needed to do. Abby [Goodsell] played great in that game and tonight, to lead us in scoring both times, and with Gabby [Kaiser], we knew that we had a size mismatch, so that plan was to feed it to her,” senior guard Annanya Raghavan said. “We have so many weapons on the team that you basically have to pick your poison on who you want to stop. Anyone can go off on any given day, so it’s a great team to be a part of.”
Raghavan is one of only two four-year seniors on the team. She noted how special this moment was.
“It’s really special. At the beginning of the year, we set our goals on what we wanted to do, and to be able to accomplish one of them is great. I mean, 27-3, when you look at that record, it just tells you of how special of a team we have here,” Raghavan said.
Sophomore guard Zoe March knew that she was part of a special team since the beginning of the season, and she looks at this moment as a blessing.
“I didn’t know [winning the PacWest championship] was going to happen, but I certainly believed that it could happen. It’s not a surprise to me, it’s definitely a blessing and I look at it as God brought our team together, and it’s because of Him that we have great unity,” March said. “We go out there to honor Him and in doing so, we have been successful that’s just been a blessing.”
March also noted the confidence that this team has in each other, which has been another key factor to their success.
“We are confident because we trust each other completely and we trust our work ethic,” March said. “Yes, we are confident, not because of our past wins, but because of the hard work that we put into the gym.”
After the Cougars victory, Hawaii Pacific also won their final game of the season, finishing with a record of 24-3 and 18-2 in conference. Since both APU and HPU ended the season with the same conference record and split the two games with each other, both teams were named co-champions in the PacWest.
However, the Cougars were awarded the tiebreaker over Hawaii Pacific in the PacWest Tournament which begins on March 1, earning a first-round bye and the No. 1 seed in the bracket.
Even with the success the team has had so far, their mission is not over yet. Their early season goals included not only winning the PacWest Conference and the PacWest Tournament, but also the West Regionals, and then a national title.
“It feels like we have unfinished business,” Hardeman said. “Don’t get me wrong though, it feels great to win the title. It was one of our goals. We have checked a goal off and get after the next goals. I think when we step back and look at this, we will say this is awesome. To get this title is a neat accomplishment, that won’t go away.”
The team are thinking with a similar mindset as well, because they know that since the regular season is over, it only takes one loss to end their phenomenal season.
“There’s no room for leniency. Now we’re going in headstrong, we know exactly what we want, we know the goals that we set and every time we step on court, we understand that it could be our last as a unit,” March said. “Every time we step onto the court, we’re going to give 100 percent, we’re going to be confident in our abilities, confident in each other and the mentality is that we’re going to cut down the net after all of this and we are going to be able to look back and see all the hard work pay off.”
The No. 1-seeded Cougars will take on the winner of the Point Loma-Concordia game in the PacWest Tournament on Friday, March 2 in Riverside, Calif.