Fresno State women’s basketball star Ki-Ki Moore — the team’s leader in points, rebounds, and assists — played her final game at the Save Mart Center on Saturday along with seniors Rosie Moult and Jeanna Furst.
Moore, who transferred from Washington State after her freshman season, announced her decision to end her career due to lingering injuries and pain via a university release issued on Friday.
Moore notified the coaching staff of her decision on Wednesday, according to another university release.
“I’m happy with the decision I’ve made. I think it’s best for me,” said Moore after Saturday’s 90-64 win over Mountain West Conference opponent UNLV at the Save Mart Center.
“It was a hard decision to make,” she said.
Fresno State coach Raegan Pebley said the first time she and Moore talked about the possibility of Moore ending her career after this season was “about two months ago.”
“I didn’t try and talk her out of it,” Pebley said. “I didn’t feel like that was my role to talk somebody out of such a huge decision. It was to support her in the process of making the decision.”
Moore, who underwent ankle surgery in the offseason, said she took into consideration the severity of the pain she said she had been feeling after games this season — along with whether or not she felt she would be able to tolerate the pain while playing another season — in making her decision.
“I mean, when you’ll never know anything’s wrong with me (during games), so as long as I keep that pace I feel like I’m fine. No one knows what I go through behind scenes,” said Moore, who was last season’s Western Athletic Conference Player of the Year.
Moore will graduate this spring with a bachelor’s degree in communications, though had another year of eligibility that she could have used to pursue a graduate degree after sitting out the 2010-11 season per NCAA transfer rules.
Kennita Chambers, Moore’s mother and her “biggest supporter and fan,” who makes a six-hour, 600-mile round trip from San Francisco to watch every Fresno State home game, reflected on her daughter’s time as a Bulldog.
“Basically, seeing her play is a good thing because its something that she enjoys doing and she’s done for a long time,” Chambers said.
“However, I do see a difference in her play right now because she’s not totally happy with the style of game that they changed to. My biggest thing is for her to get her education first and then ball. So as long she gets her degree, I’m more than happy with that.”
Chambers added: “She was recruited here at Fresno State for a reason. When she got here, she felt really warm and welcome. And it’s kind of funny to be here today, knowing that this is the last time that she’ll actually play in the arena. It’s a sad occasion, but it’s a good occasion.”
Moore finished with a game-high 19 points, 10 assists and seven rebounds against UNLV.
Moore, Moult and Furst were honored after Saturday’s win — Fresno State’s last game at home and of the season.
“The thing we just told her is that her career deserved to be honored. If she knew she was going to be done, we wanted to give her Senior Night,” Pebley said.
“Again, the No.1 goal was to support her in the decision, and she’s got a great family to help her with that choice, that’s have peace about it so that she doesn’t have regret later.”
Fresno State will enter the March 13-16 Mountain West tournament as the No. 2 seed, and will face No. 7 Boise State (11-17, 4-11 MWC) in the quarterfinals on Thursday at 6 p.m.
And what’s next for Moore after the conference tournament?
“The NCAA tournament,” she said.