Utah Women’s basketball won a much needed bounce-back game over McNeese on Monday night. The 118-50 victory was a full team effort flooded with shining performances from the Lady Runnin’ Utes.
Following the game, head coach Lynne Roberts said, “That was a good ‘get right’ game in terms of our shooting and scoring. Everyone contributed and everyone did their job. We played with a lot more swagger. No game is perfect and as a coach my job is to nitpick but I’m not going to do that tonight. We played as hard as we could. We shot much better than we did against Northwestern and I’m proud of how the team bounced back.”
Roberts was pleased with the way her team regrouped after being knocked down in Chicago. Heartbreaking road losses often linger within programs, especially early on in the season, so the effort that Roberts’ team produced on Monday should not go unnoticed.
Juniors Gianna Kneepkens and Matyson Wilke led the way for the Utes. Kneepkens put up a game-high 24 points on 8-12 shooting while Wilke contributed a career-high 19 points off the bench.
When asked about her career night, Wilke said, “This week our focus was on executing our roles. Coming off the bench, my job is to bring energy any way I can. Last week, I didn’t do my job of making open shots. We have a lot of talent on this team and they draw a lot of double teams and my job is to make those open threes, and I didn’t do that last week. I’ve worked a lot this week to get my mindset right in doing my job and trusting my teammates to do theirs.”
On Monday night, the team’s collective mindset of executing roles was apparent. Senior forward Mayè Tourè dominated her spot down low with 21 points and 8 rebounds on an efficient night from the field. Sophomore Reese Ross executed her role off the bench, gathering 16 points, 8 rebounds and 4 assists.
Overall, the Utes performed incredibly after a tough loss to Northwestern. Moving forward, Utah will look to keep the ball rolling as they take on Saint Joseph’s at 7 p.m. on Friday, Nov. 22 at the Jon M. Huntsman Center.
