One night after losing their first game of the season, a 23-point loss to the unbeaten and 12th-ranked CSU-Pueblo, the Fort Lewis women’s basketball team bounced back in a big way.
While Friday night’s game was “loose” defensively, as head coach Jason Flores called it, Saturday’s matchup against New Mexico Highlands was the opposite. The Skyhawks were air tight on the defensive end from the opening tip and forced the opponents into a frustrating 17 percent shooting. The early effort led to a 22-6 advantage in the opening quarter that set the tone for the evening, as Fort Lewis cruised to a 79-48 win, its first of the year in the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference
Briana Clah led Fort Lewis (5-1, 1-1 RMAC) with 19 points and dished out a team-high six assists. Alyssa Yocky added 12 points and Kayla Herrera poured in 11.
“Like coach says, success on defense translates to success on offense, and I take pride in stopping my opponent,” Herrera said. “It fires me up and it fires all of us up when we start getting defensive stops.”
The Skyhawks really put the clamps on the Cowgirls in the opening 20 minutes. New Mexico Highlands (2-4, 1-1 RMAC) managed to make only three of its first 17 attempts from the field, and the second quarter wasn’t much better. Fort Lewis held the opponents to single digits in the first two quarters and led 35-15 at halftime.
“Overall it was a great response from us after last night,” Flores said. “Even if you’re having a bad offensive night, which we didn’t, but if we did, the defense would have carried us.”
New Mexico Highlands started to find a rhythm in the second half, but Clah and the Skyhawks put away any hopes of a comeback with success at the foul line. Clah was 8-for-9 from the charity stripe, and the team finished 23-for-26 overall for the game.
“It’s important to me to have a balance on both ends,” Clah said. “If were working hard to get stops on defense, it’s my job to make sure we’re scoring on the other end, too.”
Fort Lewis will try to keep up its winning ways at 5:30 p.m. Friday on the road at perennial RMAC contender Colorado Mesa (5-1, 2-0 RMAC).
jfries@durangoherald.com
