As the clock reached triple-zeros against George-Fox, there was a melancholic realization that the big dance was over for the University of Puget Sound’s women basketball team.
There was still reason to celebrate though for the Loggers and the fans who followed their season.
The University of Puget Sound’s women basketball team’s post season came to an end on March 8 with a 67-49 loss to George-Fox on the second round of the NCAA DIII national tournament.
This was the fourth game between the familiar foes. George-Fox won all four of the meetings. Two of those games were regular season games, one was in the conference tournament and their final meeting was in the second round of the NCAA DIII tournament.
Senior Guard Hannah Lekson (Gig Harbor, Wash) led the Loggers in scoring with 11 points. Senior Forward Amanda Forshay (Moraga, Cali) finished her collegiate career with her sixth double-double of the season. Forshay finished the game with 10 points and 14 rebounds.
George-Fox got its first double-digit lead with 7:48 on the clock in the first half. George-Fox never led less than 10 points for the rest of the game.
University of Puget Sound and George-Fox were statistically similar in many of the major stats. The loggers shot 40 percent from the field, while holding George-Fox to 43.1% from the field.
The biggest discrepancy in the statistics was in turnovers and points off of turnovers. The loggers committed 20 to the Bruins 12. George-Fox had 27 points off turnovers, while Puget Sound had 11.
The night before, on March 6, the Loggers beat the Claremont Mudd-Skripps in the first round of the NCAA DIII tournament with a score of 61-56.
The Loggers had to come back from a 17 point first half deficit after they had their worst offensive half of the season. Claremont-M-S defense only allowed the loggers to score 19 points in the first half. The 17 point come back was the largest come back the Loggers had this season.
Senior forward Katie Ainslie (Redmond, Wash) led the team with 20 points and had 7 rebounds. Forshay added 19 points and grabbed a team high eight rebounds. Junior Guard Emily Sheldon (Portland, Ore) had six assists while committing zero turnovers.
Puget Sound shot 22 for 57 from the floor, while their defense held Claremont-M-S to 38 percent from the field. The Loggers out rebounded Claremont-M-S by four with a total of 38 rebounds. The game had three lead changes.
With 1:26 left to play in the game, Forshay drove down the middle of the lane to score the go-ahead basket, putting the Loggers up 56-55. Next possession, Ainslie hit a jump shot to increase the lead by three, making the game out of reach for Claremont-M-S. The Logger’s defense held Claremont-M-S to one point in the final five minutes.
The Loggers finished the season ranked 18 in the nation by d3hoops.com. They also finished second in the Northwest Conference, which was very competitive this year, sporting three teams that at some point in the season where ranked in the top 25. George-Fox finished the regular season ranked number three in the nation.
University of Puget Sound’s women’s basketball team finished the season with a 24-5 record. The teams 24 wins matches the most wins in a season by any women’s basketball team at the University of Puget Sound.
Forshay finishes her career as the ninth leading scorer in Puget Sound history with 1217 points. Forshay passed Claire Ely, Wendy Davis and Kelly Kaiser.
