Yet another successful Senior Day for the women and more free falling for the men.
For the fifth straight season, Kamie Ethridge’s team has sent their seniors out a winner, defeating the Saint Mary’s Gaels 72-62. The win locks the Washington State women’s team into the three-seed in the WCC tournament.
In her final game at Beasley Coliseum—and 100th straight start—Tara Wallack scored 12 points, dished five assists, and grabbed three rebounds. Dayana Mendes led the team with 16 points, scoring 10 from the free-throw line on 11 attempts.
It took WSU (18-12, 13-6 in WCC) a bit to get going, not scoring a field goal for the first 4:50, but the senior Wallack’s layup was the spark they needed. Ele Villa followed up with a triple, Mendes knocked home a short jumper, and Wallack bookended the 9-0 run with back-to-back layups. The Gaels battled back to pull within one at the beginning of the second quarter but would never get any closer.
Junior Astera Tuhina splashed a pair of treys to push the lead back out to nine, and Wallack drilled one of her own to dissrupt a Gaels 5-0 run, silence any momentum SMU was looking for before half.
WSU would balloon their lead all the way out to 20 in the fourth before the Gaels put up some resistance with an 11-2 run to pull within nine. Kyra Gardner delivered a dagger three to put away any thoughts of a miracle comeback by the Gaels. The large lead in the final seconds also allowed Ethridge to pull Wallack off the floor to a well-deserved standing ovation from the Cougar crowd.
Wallack will leave WSU as one of the most decorated players in program history. As of this most recent game, she sits at 14th all-time in points, 10th in rebounds, tied for third in games, and tied for second in blocks. She was a vital member of the Pac-12 Championship team, icing the championship with a clutch free throw in the final seconds.
“There are a lot of programs out there that you could portal to, transfer, or start here and go there. I just think Cougs are beloved. She will always be a Coug. Her heart and soul were poured into this program, and she will always be looked at after and up to. I just admire that so much. And beloved. I don’t know that you can always finish places beloved and adored. She’s made us better; she stuck it out, and she’s carried a big load with a young team and has been her best doing that. I will forever admire her, respect her, and speak of her as fondly as we ever can because she is a true Coug and will be forever.” Ethridge said about Wallack.
“I felt every emotion. Waking up today, warming up, and just knowing everyone in the stands has been there for me these past four years. My family was here. My brother, my best friend, and her parents drove down, so it just meant even more to me today. I’m just so happy and grateful for my four years here at WSU.” Wallack said.
The men’s team rounded out the Saturday doubleheader against the Santa Clara Broncos, who picked up right where they left off in their last game against WSU.
In their last meeting, the Broncos hit 40.9% of their three pointers and scored 1.39 points per possession. That doesn’t even hold a candle to what they did this time around.
The Broncos drilled an absurd amount of threes early to completely bury the Cougars before we could even hit the halftime break. SCU hit 14 of their first 18 shots of the field and 11 of their first 12 threes. It’s not even like it was all just bad defense from WSU. Everything they threw up there was finding the bottom of the net. The Broncos finished the first half shooting 64.7% from the field, 78.9% from three, and scored 61 points. That all comes out to 1.70 points per possession in the first 20 minutes of gametime and a 28-point halftime lead. They led by as much as 31 in the first half.
WSU (16-13, 6-10) didn’t help themselves much on the other end, turning the ball over 11 times in the first half. While they did shoot the ball okay, hitting 44.4% of their first half field goals, there was just no way they could keep pace with the brutally hot Broncos. N.D. Okafor was able to swat away a trio of shots near the rim in the first half as one of the few bright spots on that end of the court.
The Cougars did show some fight in the second half, pulling as close as XX as the Broncos distance shooting did cool down significantly in the second half. However, it wasn’t enough to overcome the three-point avalanche from the first half. The Broncos still hit a school record of 23 made three-pointers.
Santa Clara finished with a 109-79 victory. It’s the first time WSU has allowed over 100 points since losing to Arizona on January 31st, 2018 and the most they’ve allowed since surrendering 106 to USC in 1997.
The women’s team will conclude their regular season at the Pepperdine Tigers, while the men will honor their seniors against the San Diego Toreros on Thursday.