BOISE, Idaho - The Southern Utah women's basketball team closed out the 2019-20 season Tuesday night with a hard-fought 70-63 loss to Idaho State in the quarterfinals of the Big Sky Conference Championship Tournament.
The Thunderbirds finish their season with a record of 18-13, tied for the second-most wins in a season in program history.
"Defensively we did a pretty good job in the first half and in the second half we gave up some threes and put ourselves in a tough spot, but overall I'm proud of our performance and proud of our season," head coach Tracy Sanders said. "They were physical with us and they keyed in on Becca and did a good job of denying her. We had some other people step up and make some plays and she worked her tail off to try and do some things for us."
Harley Hansen and Rebecca Cardenas led the Thunderbirds in scoring in their final games as T-Birds with Hansen scoring 13 and Cardenas scoring 12. Jessica Chatman was the leading rebounder for SUU with six.
"We had some incredible seniors this year and they have really come in and changed the culture. Last year we were scared to lose and this year we came in with an expectation of winning every game and so much of it has had to do with these two right here [Hansen and Cardenas] and the competitiveness they have and the energy that they bring."
Cardenas finished out a season that saw her break the single-season steals record with 95 steals and score 550 points, the fourth most in a season all-time.
As a team, the Thunderbirds had their second-best all-time scoring season with 2,186 points scored. They also set a new record for three-pointers made in a season with 197.
The Bengals jumped out to a quick 7-0 lead in the first minute and a half of play, forcing the Thunderbirds into two turnovers during that stretch.
Harley Hansen broke the streak and got the Thunderbirds on the board with a three-pointer to make it 7-3 with 6:45 to go in the quarter. That sparked a 7-0 scoring run of their own, as Ashley Larsen and Cardenas both made buckets to tie the game at 7-7.
The Thunderbirds took their first lead of the game on a Madelyn Eaton driving layup to make it 9-7 at the 2:31 mark.
The game tied three more times throughout the quarter before it came to an end with the Bengals leading 17-15.
Hansen opened the second quarter with a quick jumper to tie things back up at 17-17, but then the Bengals were able to open up a 6-0 run that made it 23-17. Cardenas stemmed the bleeding with a second-chance three that cut the ISU lead to three.
Idaho State was able to build their lead back out to six and keep the Thunderbirds at arm's length, but the T-Birds closed the half on a 6-2 scoring run and went into the halftime break down by just two.
Hansen had seven points and Larsen had four rebounds at the half.
The Thunderbirds came out hot in the third quarter, taking the lead back on a Claudia Armato three-pointer at 8:37. The teams continued to trade buckets, with the lead changing hands three more times through the first five minutes. The Bengals finally started to pull away, going on a 9-0 run to make it 49-40 with 2:34 remaining.
Hansen put ISU's run to an end with a rare four-point play, as she knocked down a deep three and the ensuing free throw after she was fouled on the shot. This launched a 8-0 run for the T-Birds and they were able to climb back within one, but the Bengals would hit a three at the buzzer to make it 52-48 with one quarter left.
The teams continued to battle with the gap between them never getting larger than six. It stayed that way until ISU's Callie Bourne hit back-to-back buckets to make it 64-56 with 5:12 to go. That seemed to cool off the T-Birds as they were just one for their next 10 from the field. They were able to keep it close with free throws, but couldn't cut it any closer than five as the Bengals closed out the 70-63 win.
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