Toure, Kneepkens lead women from Utah to 77-60 victory over Colorado away – ksl.com

Salt Lake City – Maye Toure was irresistible in the first few minutes of playing on Wednesday night against Colorado.

The senior striker had 11 points in the first few minutes, and Utah jumped to a lead of 17-5, before the guests of the buffaloes continued by 10-0 to close the early gap. But Colorado never managed to recover completely, as Utah was holding a lead, which only grown in the second half on the way to victory by 77-60 in the Huntsman Center.

“A good team won today,” said Utah Gavin Peterssen’s chief coach. “Many people embark on the Point column, but I think we also did a good job of rebound, especially in the offensive region with 12 offensive boards, creating a second chance for our team, which is great.”

Toure finished with 15 points and six rebounds, but failed to score in the second half while Colorado (16-8, 7-6 large 12) sent protection with double and triple teams to stop it around the rim.

However, Colorado’s head coach Jr Payne said that her team does not have to do something different to limit Toure’s production, except to try to limit how many offensive struggles she can collect to get points of the second chance. This attention to the recovery in the second half, she said, helped to limit the impact of Toure on the court.

Despite the sudden suspension of Toure production, the Gianna Kneepkens has taken over-as she has done in the last few weeks-to help the team be held by 11-0 in the third quarter, which pushed the Utah lead up to 23 points in the third quarter.

Kneepkens led Utah (19-5, 10-3 large 12) with 16 points in shooting 6 out of 11, adding five assists and four fights to the victory. No other jute player ends with double figures.

Outside of the hot start of Utah and its short run in the third quarter, Colorado did well to keep the game interesting for much of the game, including 8-0 rates at the end of the fourth quarter. Utah hit 51% of the terrain, but struggles to enter into a consistent rhythm at times when Colorado challenged each shot with aggressive protection.

But Colorado shot only 44% of the terrain and was not enough in the tank to fight a healthier Utah team that continued another late running to maintain the two-digit advantage.

“They just did the things they were doing, didn’t they? They hit the threes, offended, fired, fired 51% of the floor,” Payne said. “So they definitely won us tonight. Utah is a really good team and I don’t think we did what we had to do for the first three quarters, but we loved our efforts in the last quarter.”

Buffaloes had three players to finish with a double figure, with Tabitha Betson led the charge with 15 points and eight struggles in the loss. Lior Garzon added 13 points and five rebounds, while Jade Masogayo contributed 11 points.

The game itself was “separated”, Petersen said, but some of them are the limited time for practice that the team has together, in addition to some of the court composition, there is not much time together to build this chemistry.

Petersen said it was for him to help moving forward while Utah was preparing for a deep running in March, but he felt that his team continued to fight, especially at the beginning of the game, to establish an early lead.

“I was really excited to see my start in the first quarter to really arrange us,” Petersen said. “And then as the game was going, I think there were times when we took off our foot from the gas pedal that should not happen, but sometimes it happens. … We must be able to close the games on a high note and be able to to leave teams.

“When we start doing things ourselves and be separated, then we are just another average program,” he added. “So to be great, I think you have to win this with your efforts at the protective end and then you have to move.”

Utah still ended the night with a 17 -point victory.

“The missed shots and speeds will happen – it’s part of basketball – but we can always give 100% effort,” Kneepkens said.