Mountain West Conference opponents have been a breeze for the Fresno State women’s basketball team, as it beat the San Jose State Spartans 58-46 at the Save Mart Center on Wednesday night. Senior Alex Sheedy (15 points) led the Bulldogs and post players Toni Smith and Bego Faz Davalos contributed 14 and 11 points, respectively.
This was the ‘Dogs eighth straight win and the longest winning streak since last season.
Fresno State controlled the game from the beginning and forced San Jose State into bad shots and off-tempo offense all night, as the Spartans shot just 26 percent from the field on 17-0f-66 shooting, going just 5-of-29 from 3-point range on the night.
Ta’Rea Cunnigan’s 16 points on 7-of-14 shooting from the field led SJS’s offense.
The closest the Spartans got to the ‘Dogs was two points after a 3-pointer by Cunnigan to make it 9-7. After that, the ‘Dogs went on an 18-1 run over the next 10 minutes. This run kept the ‘Dogs in the lead with a score of 32-15 at halftime, the lowest point total for an opponent during a half this season.
In the second stanza, the Spartans started to come alive, outscoring Fresno State 31-27. The ‘Dogs committed 15 of their 23 turnovers in that half, which was a higher mark than their average of 19 turnovers a game.
This season, the ‘Dogs are outscoring opponents 553-449 in the first half, but they are tied with their opponents at 505 points apiece in the second half of all games. Fresno State head coach Jaime White addressed both the turnovers and maintaining the lead in the second half of games in her press conference.
“I don’t love our turnovers lately,” White said. “And that’s the one thing that keeps me humble is knowing that we’re averaging a high amount of turnovers. We need to make good decisions in the open court. That’s the one thing we need to cut down to beat good teams.”
With the Bulldogs now undefeated in conference play at 5-0, they will look to continue their winning streak on Saturday, when they visit the Wyoming Cowgirls.
“The wins are giving us confidence,” Sheedy said. “We have a great feeling coming into games, and we just have that feeling that we’re going to win the game. We walk a fine line between arrogance and confidence, and the wins have just kept us at bay.
“After this game, we’re thinking about what we need to work on, and playing at Wyoming is really tough. If we weren’t comfortable, we wouldn’t be winning.”
