UNM women push pace in lopsided home victory
Four Lobos score in double figures in victory over struggling Utah State
Dream-style Arena served as a getwell tonic for the UNM women’s basketball team Wednesday night.
The Lobos rediscovered their shooting touch, played gritty half-court defense and simply overpowered Utah State in a much-needed 80-47 Mountain West Conference win.
UNM (17-6, 5-5) snapped a threegame losing streak and for one night resembled the team that started the season 15-1. Jaisa Nunn racked up 20 points and 12 rebounds (her 12th double-double of the season) and the Lobos drained 15 3-pointers in the rout. Utah State (5-17, 3-8) finished 1-for-9 from behind the arc.
The night’s most telling stat may have been this: UNM’s Cherise Beynon scored just four points after amassing 71 in her team’s two most recent losses. The senior point guard collected 12 assists and three steals and did not need to score as four other Lobos provided double-figure point totals.
“We like this better and I think (Beynon) likes it better, too,” said senior Tesha Buck, who finished with 15 points on five 3s. “Cherise has been playing really well but we gave her a lot more help tonight. That’s the way it should be.”
Madi Washington also chipped in 15 points and hit five 3s, while Alex Lapeyrolerie scored 11 points and hit
three 3-pointers for the Lobos. Laneah Bryan added eight points in 15 quality minutes off the bench.
UNM coach Mike Bradbury was most impressed by his team’s defense. The Lobos limited Utah State to 34.5 percent shooting and forced 19 turnovers.
The Aggies scored just four points in the second quarter and did not score at all for a span of 8:39 around halftime. New Mexico led 22-14 after one quarter but was up 46-18 when Utah State’s Shannon Dufficy hit a drought-busting 3-pointer with 8:05 left in the third quarter.
“Defensively, I thought that was one of the better games we’ve played,” Bradbury said. “We’ve spent a lot of time on defense the last 10 days and some people really bought in. We weren’t perfect, we can still get better, but I thought our kids played really hard.”
UNM ended up outrebounding the much taller Aggies 36-34 but did considerably more damage in transition. The Lobos finished with a 28-4 advantage on fast-break points and had 24 assists on their 30 field goals.
“We did a good job finding the open player tonight,” Nunn said, “and when we were open, we made the shots. The last couple games we took too many contested shots and obviously didn’t make them. Tonight we got back to pushing in transition and moving the ball.”
Utah State got 14 points from post Hailey Bassett, including a pair of easy baskets in the opening minutes when the Aggies grabbed a 6-2 lead. But Buck, Lapeyrolerie and Washington combined to hit four 3-pointers over the rest of the quarter as UNM took control.
The Lobos were short-handed without freshmen Jasmine Smith (concussion) and Antonia Anderson (knee sprain), but Washington and Bryan helped UNM rack up a 26-12 advantage in bench points.
“Madi and (Bryan) gave us really good minutes,” Bradbury said. “All our starters were able to get a little rest and that was big.”
Bradbury declined to read too much into a home win over the struggling Aggies, who fell to 1-10 on the road this season. Buck was a bit more optimistic that Wednesday’s solid performance could be a turning point.
“It feels good to get a win under our belt,” she said. “We can’t forget the games we lost, but if we pull together and play like this, I feel like we can start a little run.”
UNM hosts San Jose State on Saturday.