Nicole Canepa made a baseline jumper. Ellie Manou cut through the lane for a lay-up. Ellyce Ironmonger made a shot from the free throw line. Victoria Kenyon grabbed the board and made a lay-up.
With shooters misfiring from the perimeter, the Oregon women’s basketball team went inside Thursday night in a 64-45 win against visiting Washington State.
The win, in front of 2,468 fans at McArthur Court, moved Oregon above .500 overall at 9-8 and evened the Ducks Pacific-10 Conference record at 3-3. Washington lost its eighth straight and is now 3-14 overall and 0-6 in conference play.
Oregon’s post players combined for 36 of the Ducks’ 64 points. Nicole Canepa continued to work her way into the Oregon’s rotation after suffering a sprained ankle in the middle of December and led the Ducks with 12 points.
Ironmonger had 10 points, Kenyon eight and Manou six.
“They made themselves available and that’s all we ask them to do,” point guard Tamika Nurse said. “They’re playing very well and you have to reward them by giving them the ball.”
Nurse emerged in the second half and found the posts for easy scores on a night where she had six assists.
“Obviously, they’re young but they’re talented and I thought them pounding us on the glass in high-low was very effective for Oregon,” Washington State coach June Daugherty said. “Unfortunately, we didn’t have an answer.”
Oregon outrebounded Washington State 46-32, including 29-20 on the defensive boards.
It didn’t help Washington State’s cause that their guards were misfiring from the perimeter. Katie Appleton, the Cougars’ second-leading three-point shooter, was 1 of 9 from the field and Colleen Betteridge just 2 of 6.
Neither team shot well in the early going. Tied at 4, Oregon used a 6-0 run for a 10-4 lead and upped the lead to 11, 20-9, on a layup by Manou. Betteridge hit a three-pointer with six seconds left to cut Oregon’s lead to nine at halftime, 32-23.
But Oregon opened the second half with a 16-5 run that stretched the lead to 20, 48-28, and Washington State never seriously threatened after that.
The win helped erase bad memories of the Ducks’ blowout loss last weekend at Stanford. Playing inside McArthur Court’s friendly confines, Smith and the Oregon players emphasized the importance of winning at home and moving out of the middle of the pack in the Pac-10 standings.
“We had to come out with a lot of intensity and a lot of grit ’cause obviously that’s what we lacked in the Stanford game,” guard Taylor Lilley said. “We had so much energy because we just wanted to get that bad taste out of our mouth.”
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