CALGARY – Buoyed by a much better effort after a tough night on Friday against the Fraser Valley Cascades, the Calgary Dinos paid their visitors back on Saturday, beating the Cascades by a score of 77-60.
BOX SCORE
Dinos forward Ashley Hill led all scorers with 25 points on the night, going five of 12 from her preferred spot behind the arc after missing on all of her six attempts on Friday. The fifth year senior added seven rebounds to round out an excellent performance.
The story of the game however was not on offence, but on the defensive side of the ball, where Calgary played spirited basketball. The Dinos had 11 steals on the night, and countless positive defensive ball touches which led to 23 total Cascade turnovers. Calgary improved substantially with their own ball control, limiting their giveaways to 12 after 29 on Saturday.
Both teams had a tough time rebounding the ball on Saturday, with an uncharacteristic amount of offensive boards being gobbled up by both sides. Calgary and Fraser Valley had 15 and 13 respectively, with the positive for both sides being that the numbers were fairly even, giving neither side an advantage in that respect.
The Cascades hit 10 of 27 from the three point line in another fairly successful night shooting from long range after a 13 for 29 performance on Friday. Four of those threes came on six attempts in the first quarter however, a clip that Fraser Valley could not keep up over the duration of the match.
Calgary got an excellent effort from Alex Cole, who was her normal pesky self as the physical presence in the Dinos' up-tempo style. Cole collected eight rebounds, four of those being of the offensive variety, and added 17 points on seven for 13 shooting. Megan Lang had a spirited game as well, hitting for eight points to go along with five assists and five rebounds.
Sarah Wierks was the Cascades' best player on the night, draining 14 points and snatching 11 rebounds. Her sister, Nicole, was also a pest on the boards on Saturday, grabbing 13 with seven of those coming on offence. Aieisha Luyken was the primary playmaker for Fraser Valley, padding her 12 points with five assists and four rebounds.
Dinos Head Coach Shawnee Harle will have a much better sleep tonight after her team's tough loss on Friday.
“I thought that we were significantly better on both ends of the floor tonight,” said Harle. “Fraser Valley definitely gave us a wake-up call last night, and I really thought we came ready to play today with guns-a-blazing. Ashley Hill stepped up on offence, and the biggest difference was that we stepped up defensively.”
In salvaging the weekend split, the Dinos (4-8) managed to keep pace with the eighth place Cascades, who drop to 7-7 on the year and remain three games up on the Dinos. Coach Harle remains confident in her teams' ability to claw back in the standings after Saturday's performance.
“We realize that we have a lot of ground to make up yet,” continued the Coach, “but if we keep playing like we did tonight, we are definitely on the right track.”
Calgary will travel to Vancouver next weekend to face the UBC Thunderbirds for a two-game set, while the Fraser Valley Cascades will host the conference-leading and no.8 ranked Alberta Pandas in Abbotsford.
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