The University of Regina's women's basketball team dropped a 69-49 road decision to the Victoria Vikes on Friday night in a Canada West play-in game.
The game was close through one quarter, but Victoria began to build up a big lead in the second. The Vikes closed the first half on a 16-5 run and led by 10 at the break, then used separate 8-0 and 10-2 runs in the third to pull away from the Cougars.
"We got into a bit of a funk where we couldn't hit shots and that energized them," Cougars head coach
Dave Taylor said. "It wasn't one of our better nights and not for lack of effort on our part. We just didn't shoot the ball well enough, and credit to Victoria. I thought they were very aggressive tonight and they did a good job of attacking when we were trying to play our way out of a hole."
Shooting was indeed the difference in the game, as Regina shot 27% from the field compared to 46% for Victoria.
The game marked the final time in a U of R uniform for three fifth-year Cougars as
Michaela Kleisinger,
Avery Pearce, and
Alexi Rowden finish off their U SPORTS careers. All three were heavily involved as Kleisinger and Rowden were the team's two scoring leaders with 12 and nine points respectively while Pearce finished with seven.
Emily Dewey added eight points for the Cougars, while
Macaela Crone scored six and pulled down a game-high 11 rebounds.
Victoria, which was led by Marissa Dheensaw's 17 points, will advance to the Canada West quarterfinals next weekend. The No. 7-seeded Vikes will travel to Saskatoon where they'll match up with No. 2 Saskatchewan. Ashlyn Day and Aleah Ashlee both helped out with 15 points for the Vikes, who snap a 10-game postseason losing streak against the Cougars.
While the Cougars lose the trio of graduating fifth-year players, they can return as many as seven from this year's roster. Crone,
Kaitlyn Tonita,
Zoe Hartmann, and
Faith Reid still have two years of eligibility remaining,
Emily Dewey and
Madeleine Tell have three, and
Ella Farthing has four.
