LOGAN, Utah – Utah State women's basketball opened the 2022-23 season with a 75-58 win over the College of Idaho on Monday at the Dee Glen Smith Spectrum. The Aggies led wire-to-wire, starting the game on a 12-0 run.
"Proud of the win," head coach
Kayla Ard said. "Always happy to get a win but I think we had some sloppy moments and we have a couple things we need to clean up. I'm really proud of our defensive effort. Our goal was to try to hold them under 60 points. We've been focused on defense and rebounding. We won the rebounding war and we did a pretty good job on defense. So I'm really proud of those areas."
USU jumped out to a 12-0 lead in the first two-and-a-half minutes of the game, stretching the lead to 18-2 halfway through the first quarter. The lead ballooned to a game-high 24 points in the second quarter as the Aggies cruised to a 42-26 halftime lead.
Utah State again took control of the game in the third quarter, utilizing a 9-2 run to again extend the lead above 20 points for much of the remainder of the contest. The Aggies led by as many as 24 points multiple times in the fourth quarter before a late COI run led to the final score of 75-58.
Sophomore
Cristina Oliva led USU with 17 points on the night, inflicting most of her damage via a 5-for-7 night from behind the 3-point line in addition to five rebounds. Graduate senior
Maria Carvalho narrowly missed a double-double, finishing with 14 points and a team-high nine rebounds, plus five assists and three steals.
"I think it starts with Maria (Carvalho)," Ard said. "She never gets tired, she could play 40 minutes and I love that about her. She's our point guard. She's our engine. We go as she goes. Her picking the ball up at half court and heating that ball-handler up, I think it rubs off on Tamiah (Robinson), it rubs off on Cristina (Oliva) or whoever our other guards are and then the post players fall behind that. I think it starts with her and she's doing a phenomenal job for us just setting the tone."
Graduate seniors
Prima Chellis and
Mayson Kimball also reached double figures in scoring with 10 points apiece, also adding five and four rebounds, respectively. Junior
Tamiah Robinson added eight points, eight rebounds and four assists while graduate senior
Abby Wahl finished with nine points and five rebounds on the night.
"It feels good," Oliva said. "We've been waiting the whole year to be doing this right now. So coming out into our home opener, we were just so excited. We spent all week practicing like crazy, being aggressive every single day. We really carried it over into today. We can do better but we definitely have something to prove."
USU controlled the rebounding game, 46-34, over the Coyotes. The Aggies also shot over 38.2 percent from the field, including a 39.1 percent mark on 9-for-23 shooting from behind the arc.
"We've been working on shooting all week," Oliva said, "so it definitely carried over into today's game."
Utah State continues its non-conference schedule when it welcome Southeastern Louisiana to the Spectrum on Friday, Nov. 11, at 3 p.m. (MT).
Fans can follow USU women's basketball on Twitter, @USUWBasketball, on Instagram, @USUWBasketball, as well as on Facebook, at /USUWBB. Aggie fans can also follow Utah State Athletics on Twitter, @USUAthletics, on Instagram, @USUAthletics and on Facebook at /USUAthletics.
- USU -