Oregon Ducks women’s basketball drops barnburner with Utah Tech Trailblazers
In the first game of the Trailblazer Classic in St. George, Utah, the four-game win streak for Oregon was snapped by host Utah Tech Tuesday afternoon, 92-86.
The Ducks had a chance to tie it late after trailing by 17 at halftime, outscoring the Trailblazers 26-14 in the third quarter and bringing the deficit to just three after an Ula Chamberlin 3-pointer with 47 seconds left. Sofia Bell intercepted a lob pass with 26 seconds left, setting up a chance to tie it, but Grace VanSlooten was blocked from behind on a layup attempt and Utah Tech sealed the game with free throws.
The Ducks (8-4) couldn’t keep pace with a red-hot shooting Trailblazer squad that made 49.3% of their baskets and 21 of their 31 3-point attempts. Oregon countered with its best 3-point effort of the early season, making 10-of-22 led by Chance Gray’s six made shots from deep but couldn’t get enough stops to win.
“The way we play, we just can’t make that up,” Oregon coach Kelly Graves said. “We score a lot from the free throw line and a lot of twos. I thought offensively we played a pretty good ball game tonight … hats off to them. We just kind of fell apart defensively. They hit them early, and when you hit them early, you feel that confidence.”
Gray was one of two Ducks with 20-point outings, scoring exactly 20 with nine rebounds. VanSlooten was the other, shooting 11-for-23 from the field for 25 points and nine boards. Junior Phillipina Kyei scored 17 points and hauled in nine rebounds, as well. Chamberlin scored a season-best 11 points off the bench, and in her first career start, freshman Sarah Rambus scored four points in 14 minutes.
The Ducks will have one day of rest in St. George before returning to play against Oklahoma State on Thursday at 1 p.m.
Alec Dietz covers University of Oregon football, volleyball, women’s basketball and baseball for The Register-Guard. You may reach him at adietz@registerguard.com and you can follow him on Twitter @AlecDietz.
This article originally appeared on Register-Guard: Oregon women’s basketball drops barnburner with Utah Tech
