T-wolves score triple-digit win
In their previous six seasons competing in Canada’s women’s university basketball league, never had the UNBC Timberwolves broken the 100-point barrier.
They did that Saturday in Calgary, where they laid a 10759 beating on the Mount Royal University Cougars – the biggest margin of victory ever for the T-wolves since they joined the Canada West conference in 2012.
Coming on the heels of a 93-61 triumph over Mount Royal Friday night, UNBC is off to a 2-0 start for the first time in team history.
“It was a good weekend for us,” said T-wolves head coach Sergey Shchepotkin.
Maria Mongomo hit for 26 points and 14 rebounds on Saturday, Madison Landry had a 24-point night and UNBC post Vasiliki Louka finished with 21 points and 18 rebounds. T-wolves point guard Emily Holmes dished out four assists in each game.
On Friday, Louka and Mongomo each shot 22 points, while Landry totaled 21. Mongomo forced five steals from the Cougars on the weekend.
“Maria is Maria, she got a lot of steals and she was good on rebounding and she scored – she did her job,” said Shchepotkin. “I’m very happy with all the girls, they are not looking for their own points actually. They made a lot of passes to teammates and they weren’t greedy for points and I’m enjoying watching their basketball. Hopefully we can keep that going in the season.”
In both games, UNBC was deadly from the free-throw line. The Timberwolves sunk 26 of 30 (86.7 per cent) on Saturday, after a 23-for-28 (82.1 per cent) night on Friday.
“That shouldn’t be a big surprise because last year we were the best team in Canada West in free-throw percentage (77.5 per cent) and I hope we will stay at that level,” said Shchepotkin. “They played pretty aggressive against us.”
Picking up where they left off after going 8-0 in the preseason, the T-wolves put up two convincing wins at the expense of a very young and inexperienced Cougar squad. Shchepotkin didn’t put too much stock into what happened on the court in Calgary, knowing the T-wolves have 18 games ahead of them this season, starting with a two-game homestand against the Winnipeg Wesmen this weekend. Last year the Wesmen pushed the national silvermedalist Saskatchewan Huskies to the limit in their best-of-their quarterfinal playoff series.
“Our main games are still in front of us,” said Shchepotkin. “I’m happy that we followed our system and everybody focused on doing their best and everybody seems ready for the big games.”