As a member of the UC San Diego Tritons, Sumayah Sugapong played against UC Riverside each of the last two years. Her team went 3-1 in that period. After her first game against them as an Arizona Wildcat, she is 4-1.
Arizona women’s basketball had some challenges in its first regular season game under first-year head coach Becky Burke. When all was said and done, the Wildcats were 1-0 after a 62-59 victory in McKale Center on Thursday night.
“I’m so excited for our team,” Burke said. “We’re 1-and-0. That was the goal at the start of the game, obviously. Come out after 40 minutes, and be on top on the scoreboard. We really know how to make it interesting, so I need to correct and fix some things down the stretch and make sure we don’t make it quite as interesting as we did. But at the end of the day, they found a way to win. It’s so hard to win college basketball games at any level, and I think you’ve just seen improvement from exhibition one to exhibition two to game one, and that’s what we look for as coaches.”
Arizona once again had trouble hitting shots and rebounding the ball. In the exhibition loss to Division II West Texas A&M, the Wildcats were outrebounded 45-37 by a team that started a 5-foot-11 post player and four guards. Burke called it a matter of toughness after that game.
That problem cropped its head up in the beginning of the season opener. UCR had 20 rebounds to UA’s 12 after the first 20 minutes. The game ended with the Highlanders winning the rebounding battle 33-24.
Burke was not as worried about it this time. She accounted for the rebounding disparity by saying that Arizona’s cold shooting gave UCR a lot of opportunities. So, she wasn’t as worried about the defensive rebounds. However, she was worried about offensive boards.
“We got out rebounded, but it’s because of our missed layups and tons of missed shots in that first half,” Burke said. “So I think it’s a little bit deceiving. But yes, we are continuing to get better on the offensive glass, or avoiding 0-boards by the other team, but it’s still a work in progress, for sure.”
To that point, almost one-third of the Highlanders’ rebounds were on the offensive end. They not only outrebounded the Wildcats 23-19 on the defensive end but also won the offensive rebounding battle 10-5.
The cold shooting was a problem at the start, both from rebounding and scoring perspectives. Arizona scored the first three points of the game in under a minute then didn’t score again until Sugapong hit two free throws at 4:44 in the first quarter.
When the final 20 minutes were over, the Highlanders were shooting 40.9 percent overall and 36.4 percent from beyond the arc. The Wildcats had hit 29.6 percent of their shots overall and 14.3 percent from 3.
The home team finally found its way in the third quarter. Sixth-year guard Micky Perdue was a major force in the turnaround, but she needed help.
Perdue helped Arizona stay in it in the second quarter. She had seven of her nine first-half points in that frame. The only other Wildcat to score in the second was Nora Francois with two points.
Perdue kept it going in the third with eight more points. She went 3 for 7 from the field and 2 for 4 from distance.
The rest of the team got going, as well. Unlike the second quarter when they scored just nine points, the Wildcats had 23 in the third. Having five players in the scoring column instead of only two lifted the home team into the lead. The two point-deficit they faced at the half turned into a seven-point lead at the end of 30 minutes.
“I think they were really coachable at halftime,” Burke said. “We saw a lot of zone in the first half, which we haven’t played against so far this year in either of our exhibitions, and obviously just until this game. So another thing where it’s like first time you’re seeing it as a group and you’re just getting more comfortable and more confident. They were kind of sitting on some of our spots that we wanted to capitalize on in our zone offense in the first half, so we went to more of a ball screen continuity in the second half, which was much, much better for us. So they were really coachable. Really coachable. They adjusted. It’s not something we’ve practiced a ton, but this was really good in-game experience to handle that zone.”
The game was by no means over, though. Starting point guard Lani Cornfield picked up her fourth foul with 39.2 seconds to go in the third quarter.
Her team held it together without her. The Wildcats led by seven at the end of the third, but had stretched that to nine when the Highlanders called time with 6:13 left in the game.
UC Riverside regrouped at the timeout. The 3-point shots started to go in again. The game was tied with just under two minutes to go.
Cornfield put Arizona back up by two points, but the Highlanders had another chance to tie with 34.6 seconds on the clock. Cornfield was called for her fifth foul, sending Kaylani Polk to the line for two free throws and Cornfield to the bench for the final seconds. Polk only made one of two.
“So that last minute, I’m not going to lie, my toes were was curling in my shoes,” said freshman forward Daniah Trammell.
It wasn’t the last chance for the Highlanders. Arizona called time with 25.6 seconds to go. The ensuing inbounds play ended in a held ball and a turnover by Trammell. She looked to her teammates for reassurance.
“I had Micky and Sumayah on the floor, and them being the leaders that they are, they just told me, like, stay poised,” Trammell said. “Like, even though I messed up the possession before by not stepping to the ball, she told me I need to correct on that. But being on the floor with them, people who know the game, sleep and breathe the game, I felt comfortable.”
UCR had the arrow, the ball, and a chance to take the lead with 11.6 seconds to go. The Highlanders chose to dribble out much of the clock, and they didn’t get a good look.
To compound the error, Maya Chocano fouled Sugapong. The Arizona guard stepped to the line and sank both free throws for the final margin.
The 1.6 seconds left weren’t enough for UCR to get a good shot. The attempted 3 at the buzzer was way short.
It was the second straight game the Highlanders lost by just three points. Their season opener against California Baptist ended with the same margin of victory.
Up Next for Arizona Women’s Basketball
UC Irvine (1-0) @ Arizona Wildcats (1-0)
When: Sunday, Nov. 9 @ 2 p.m. MST
Where: McKale Center in Tucson, Ariz.
Streaming:ESPN+
Radio:1400 AM (KTUC)
Stats:Arizona Live Stats
Arizona’s starting lineup consisted of three freshmen. Trammell was joined by Molly Ladwig and MJ Jurado. Cornfield and Sugapong gave Arizona a four-guard starting lineup.
Perdue responded to not getting the start by leading the game with 17 points on 6-of-15 shooting. She hit 3 of 9 shots from 3-point distance and went 2 for 2 from the free throw line. She added 3 rebounds and 1 block. Her 34 minutes on the court were more than any Wildcat except Sugapong.
“I literally have challenged Micky since the day she set foot on this campus,” Burke said. “This is a totally different style of play. I’m a totally different coach. She’s playing with people she’s never met before, and you know, after our first exhibition game, I wasn’t happy with her effort, and I told her that straight up, and we had a really hard conversation in my office. And I think players could respond two ways. They could get pouty, they could just kind of crawl in a hole, or get resentful towards you as the head coach for making decisions that you make, or they can come in and just get ultra competitive and just play even harder and respond. And that is what she has done, and the response, the character that she has shown since I challenged her and since she’s been humbled a little bit by me in practice and in the film room has been tremendous.”
It’s something Perdue expected when she came to Arizona.
“I came here to be challenged,” Perdue said. “That was what I told Coach Burke when I was on the phone getting recruited…I told her in her office the other day, ‘okay, you want to challenge me? I like that.’ I’m competitive, and I’m a competitive person, and I’m never going to change the way I play. I’m going to make sure that I’m doing whatever is asked of me, and I’m going to make sure I do it to the best of my ability. And that’s what I think I did the last week or two, and it’s paying off.”
Despite going 1 for 9 from the field, Sugapong made an impact on the game in her 38 minutes of playing time. She went 6 for 6 from the line and ended the night with 9 points. She added 6 rebounds, 2 assists, and 2 steals.
Cornfield narrowly missed a double-double with 10 points and 8 assists. She had 2 rebounds and 2 steals.
Fouls were Cornfield’s Achilles heels. She picked up her fourth foul with 39.2 seconds left in the third corner. She had to sit for about half of the fourth, then came back with 4:03 to go in the game. She finally got the fifth whistle with under a minute to go.
Arizona had some foul trouble in its exhibitions. Cornfield and Sugapong have been affected the most, but they have done it while playing a lot of minutes. It happened again in the season opener.
Sugapong ended with three fouls, but she also drew four on the Highlanders in over 38 minutes on the court. Jurado also had three fouls in almost 32 minutes of play. Cornfield fouled out in about 28 minutes.
The players and coaches get the opportunity to make more improvements on Sunday when UC Irvine comes to town. The Anteaters defeated San Diego 72-54 on Wednesday and will be playing their first road game.
