Box Score

The University of Regina's women's basketball team completed a two-game Canada West quarterfinal series sweep over Winnipeg with an 84-70 victory over the Wesmen on Saturday night at the Centre for Kinesiology, Health & Sport.

The Cougars will host the Canada West Final Four next weekend at the CKHS. UBC and Saskatchewan will clash in one Friday night semifinal beginning at 5 p.m., while Regina and Fraser Valley will tip off at 7 p.m. The losers will play in the third-place game on Saturday (5 p.m.), with the winners scheduled to play for the conference title at 7 p.m.

Unlike Friday's win, which saw the Cougars open up an early lead and essentially cruise to victory, Winnipeg posed more of a challenge on Saturday.

The Cougars opened up an early eight-point lead in the first quarter thanks to a quick start from fourth-year forward Lindsay Ledingham and led by 19 at one point in the second, but Winnipeg kept within range and cut the deficit to 14 at halftime after Amy Ogidan hit a tough runner at the buzzer.

The Wesmen chipped the lead down to single digits after scoring five points on back-to-back possessions in the third, but the Cougars got the lead right back up to 19 after going on a 13-2 run over a two-minute span late in the quarter.

Danielle Schmidt opened up the fourth quarter with an early three-pointer for the Cougars, but the home side was kept off the board for over four and a half minutes as Winnipeg reeled off 10 unanswered points to cut the lead to eight with five minutes left in the final frame.

That's when the No. 1-ranked Cougars had decided they'd seen enough, and went on a 12-1 run to seal the victory.

“We weren't as consistent defensively tonight and got beat up on the defensive glass, but we were able to shoot the ball well enough from the perimeter when it counted,” sixth-year Cougars head coach Dave Taylor said following the win, which stands as his 20th postseason victory of his career.

Ledingham led all scorers with 19 points for the Cougars and pulled down a team-high nine rebounds to fall one short of a double-double. Michelle Clark was 4-for-9 from three-point land and scored 16 to go along with six assists, while Joanna Zalesiak scored 13 and added six rebounds and six assists despite playing just 17 minutes due to foul trouble. Danielle Schmidt also had 13 points and seven rebounds for Regina.

Five Winnipeg players scored in double figures in the setback, led by Stephanie Kleysen's 15 points. Yael Kaplan had 14 points, while Ogidan and Alex Warburton both scored 13 and Tia Coulter added 11. Coulter also grabbed a game-high 12 rebounds, notching the game's lone double-double. Saturday's game marked the final action in Wesmen uniforms for fifth-year players Ogidan, Mackenzie Prasek, and Heather Hildebrandt.

Winnipeg held a 52-44 advantage on the boards as the Cougars were outrebounded for just the fourth time since the conference schedule started in November. The U of R shot 42% from the field compared to the Wesmen's 28%.

NOTES: The Cougars will be participating in their fifth consecutive Canada West Final Four and their eighth overall in 11 years in the conference ... the only other time that the University of Regina has hosted the conference Final Four was back in 2004, when the Cougars defeated Simon Fraser and UBC to claim their only Canada West title ... the Cougars extend their postseason winning streak over Winnipeg to seven games.