WBB | Huskies smother Heat in CW quarter-finals

Written by Dan Kinvig for UFV Athletics

ABBOTSFORD — The top-seeded Saskatchewan Huskies lived up to their advance billing, closing the book on the UBC Okanagan Heat’s Cinderella story in the Canada West quarter-finals on Thursday evening.

The Heat, coming off the first CW playoff win in program history on Wednesday (63-57 over Trinity Western), proved a sticky foe for the Huskies, trading runs with the nation’s No. 2-ranked team for much of the first half. 

Saskatchewan, though, seized control with a 10-0 surge to end the second quarter, and they maintained a double-digit lead the rest of the way en route to a 74-60 triumph. 

The Huskies advance to face the tournament host University of the Fraser Valley Cascades in the semis on Saturday afternoon at the UFV Athletic Centre (3 p.m., CanadaWest.tv).  

“We haven’t faced them yet this season, so it’s going to be an interesting game,” Huskies forward Tea DeMong said, looking ahead to the clash with the Cascades. “We’re excited for the atmosphere, and they’ve got a very big presence on the inside. We’ll be looking to shut that down.

“We knew it was going to be a pretty aggressive game with UBCO, and I think we came out pretty aggressive tonight. We were a bit sloppy at times, but we’re going to pick it up for our next game.”

For much of the first half, the Heat were able to answer each time the Huskies threatened to pull away. The underdogs opened the second quarter with an 8-2 surge, featuring four points from point guard Sofia Ainsa Lluch. Sask landed a haymaker at that point, though, scoring the next 10 points highlighted by four from Andrea Dodig and capped by a Carly Ahlstrom jumper to take a 39-25 lead into the break.

The Heat continued to scrap, but were dealt a blow when Kelsey Falk – one half of UBCO’s standout duo of veteran forwards alongside Jaeli Ibbetson – exited due to injury midway through the third quarter.  

The Huskies, in the end, posed a math problem the Heat simply couldn’t solve on this night. UBCO was by far the more efficient team shooting the ball – they drained 43.5 per cent of their attempts, compared to just 32.1 for Sask. But the Huskies thrived on volume. In winning both the turnover (32-12) and rebounding (47-41) battles decisively, they ended up taking 35 more shot attempts than UBCO. 

“They don’t give you whole lot of room, and they contest every defensive possession,” Heat head coach Bobby Mitchell observed. “They did a good job disrupting what we like to do, and some of our actions. I thought they sped us up and got us out of rhythm early, but I liked our compete. We stayed with it. But the 10-0 run in the first half, that was the big difference. It was a four-point game, and then you’re down 14.

“Only one team wins their last game, so there are a lot of teams that are disappointed. But what we did this year, not just last night but over the stretch of the season, it was phenomenal. I’m really proud of the group, and we’ll look back and be proud of this season. It’s tough right now, but it was a great season.” 

DeMong finished with a game-high 19 points to go with 10 rebounds and five steals, Ahlstrom notched 14 points, and Courtney Primeau was a force inside with eight points and nine boards.

“We’ve got quite a few players like Gage (Grassick) and Andy (Dodig) who are just great on the ball (defensively),” DeMong said, reflecting on her team’s propensity for generating turnovers. “When the ball handler has a lot of pressure on them, it makes it hard for anyone else to get a good shot.”

Ibbetson, for the second straight night, had a huge double-double for the Heat with 18 points and 16 boards. Lluch chipped in with 14 points, and Falk and Rachel Hettinga scored nine apiece.