Stingy defense has been a constant for the Washington women’s basketball team this season.
The offense? Well, that’s been a big struggle most games. But not Friday night at Alaska Airlines Arena.
The Huskies used a string of early three pointers — making six of their first eight attempts — to take control early and they never let up, rolling to a 70-54 win over California.
It was the second straight win for Washington, which improved to 12-9 and 4-7 in the Pac-12. California fell to 11-11 and 2-9.
“I think our entire week of practice leading up to today is what I think we’ll look back on and say, ‘That prepared us today,’” said UW coach Tina Langley, who said the team used some new offensive sets. “It started on Tuesday at practice all the way to our shootaround today. Everyone was locked in.”
The Washington defense has been good enough this season — ranked third best in the Pac-12 entering the game with an average of 58.30 points allowed per game — to keep the Huskies competitive against some of the best teams in the Pac-12.
Trouble scoring kept the Huskies — they entered the game last in the Pac-12 in scoring at 62.25 points — from winning many of those close games.
They entered the game scoring more than 58 points just once in their previous nine games, and they broke out of that slump in a most surprising way: with a three-point barrage.
Trinity Oliver made a couple of early threes to help give UW an 8-2 lead. Elle Ladine came off the bench to hit a pair of threes in the first quarter and Lauren Schwartz had one in the opening 10 minutes too.
Haley Van Dyke made a three-pointer early in the second quarter to give UW a 22-10 lead and causing Cal to call a timeout.
“You always just have a little bit of nerves, good nerves, but yeah, when they go in, it gets you going,” Oliver said.
The three-point barrage must have surprised Cal, considering UW entered the game easily the worst team in the Pac-12 from long range (85 of 356, 23.9%).
The threat of the three-pointer opened things up inside for UW, which stretched its lead to 17 points (36-19) before settling for a 36-23 lead at halftime.
The Huskies scored 24 points in the third quarter, finishing off the period with a three-pointer from Jayda Noble to give UW a 60-39 lead.
Through three quarters, the Huskies shot 50% (20 of 40) from the field, 62% from three-point range (8 of 13) and 85.7% from the foul line.
It added up to a 21-point lead and the Huskies were certainly happy to have that cushion when Cal opened the fourth quarter on a 12-2 run to pull to 62-51 with 5:04 left.
The Husky defense took it from there, holding Cal without a point for nearly four minutes, and UW stretched the lead back to 19 points.
“I just love the way we played team defense,” Langley said.
But on this night, the Huskies had much more going for them than defense. In addition to the good offense, UW also outrebounded Cal, 37-26.
“I thought from team defense, rebounding and to the way we ran our offense, it was a much more complete game,” Langley said. “And I think that’s what we’ve learned, is every single aspect of the game matters.”
Dalayah Daniels had 20 points to lead Washington and was one of four Huskies in double-figure scoring. Van Dyke added 14 points, Oliver had 10 and Ladine had 10.
Washington will almost certainly need another strong offensive performance to win its next game, at home vs. No. 2 Stanford (20-2) on Sunday.
The Huskies will certainly be going into that game with more confidence after Friday’s offensive breakthrough.