Box Score
PORTLAND, Ore. – The Idaho State women's basketball team closed the regular season with a win over Portland State Saturday afternoon. The Bengals defeated the Vikings 61-54, improving to 18-11 overall and 13-7 in Big Sky play. With the win, ISU claims the No. 4 seed at the Big Sky Conference Tournament next week in Missoula, Mont. ISU will play its first contest of the tournament either Wednesday or Thursday evening.
Saturday's win marked the 60
th program win over a three-year period bringing the Bengals' three-year average to 20 wins per season, a feat never achieved before in program history.
Seniors
Jessa Jeppesen and
Abyee Maracigan led Idaho State in scoring, notching 13 points apiece. Jeppesen had a near double-double with nine rebounds, including five o-boards. She also had two blocks in 34 minutes of play. Maracigan recorded six rebounds and tallied two assists and a steal.
“Jessa has played a lot of minutes in the last two games,” ISU Head Coach
Seton Sobolewski said. “She has worked really hard on the o-boards and did a good job of putting herself in position. Another person that has done a great job on the o-boards is
Abyee Maracigan. Abyee is running in every single time and putting herself in a position to get an o-board or to deflect a rebound to one of her teammates. She's done a great job of getting in the mix.”
Seniors
Ashleigh Vella and
Kaela Oakes also scored in double figures. Vella had 10 points with five rebounds, five assists and one steal. Oakes had 11 points with two rebounds, one assist and one steal.
The Bengals shot 39 percent from the field and 22 percent from 3-point range. ISU was 11-17 from the free throw line.
Idaho State out-rebounded Portland State 40-34 and held the Vikings' leading scorer, Courtney Vanbrocklin, to just seven points. ISU's 40 rebounds including 16 offensive rebounds and Idaho State used those o-boards to score 14 second chance points.
ISU got out to a slow start as the Vikings jumped out to a 7-0 lead at the 16:23 mark. A jumper by Jeppesen jump started ISU's offense and the Bengals came back to take the lead 11-9 with 13:46 remaining in the half. Both teams battled back-and-forth for the remainder of the first half with ISU heading into the locker room with a narrow 32-28 lead.
The game continued to stay close in the second half with ISU jumping out to its largest lead of the contest of seven points with just 2:21 remaining in the game. The Bengals shot 40.7 percent from the field in the half but struggled from the 3-point line, netting just 1-7 from that range.
Idaho State travels to Missoula, Mont., next to take on No. 5 seed Sacramento State in the first round of the Big Sky Conference Tournament. ISU will play either Wednesday or Thursday evening depending on whether or not the Montana men host the tournament as well.
“I don't think Sacramento State will do anything differently from when they played us last time,” Sobolewski said. “They will do what they did last time, only better. They didn't shoot well and some of that was us and some of that was them. I think in a one-game situation, Sacramento State is very scary. They have a lot fire power offensively and we are going to have to really step up and play hard to beat them.”
Check back at
www.isubengals.com to stay updated on the women's trip to the Big Sky Tournament.
We Are Your Bengals
