by SAN RAFAEL, Calif. – Azusa Pacific knocked off Dominican by a 65-60 final on Saturday afternoon, securing the Cougars a weekend sweep of its two-game Bay Area trip this weekend. With the victory, Azusa Pacific is now 8-3 overall and 2-0 in PacWest action.
TyLee Manuel and Sabrina Belquist both delivered double-doubles for the Cougars, with Manuel tallying 15 points and 14 rebounds, while Belquist finished with 13 points and 10 rebounds. Amayah Kirkman turned in a team-high 18 points, while also grabbing eight rebounds and recording five steals.
How It Happened: The Penguins were ahead by a 17-14 score after the first quarter, but the Cougars locked down defensively in the second, allowing just nine points in the quarter. Azusa Pacific held Dominican to 3-for-9 shooting, while also forcing the Penguins into six turnovers. On the offensive end, the Cougars scored 15 points in the second, and a three-pointer by Belquist with just under a minute to play before halftime sent the visitors into the locker room with a 29-26 lead.
The third was the highest scoring quarter for both teams, with Dominican out-scoring the Cougars by a 22-20 margin. The Penguins found their stroke from three, as they went 4-for-6 in the third from distance. While Dominican found success from outside offensively, the Cougars were able to keep pace with a steady attack inside, scoring 14 points in the paint. At the end of the third, the Cougars held a slim 49-48 advantage.
To close the game out, head coach TJ Hardeman relied upon his starting five to get the job done, as Kirkman, Manuel, Belquist, Kelly Heimburger and Audrey Sayoc played the entire 10 minutes of the fourth quarter. The Cougars won the game on the defensive end of the floor, where they held the Penguins to just 4-for-22 shooting, including 1-for-9 from three, which resulted in just 12 points scored in the quarter. Offensively, Azusa Pacific scored 16 points over the final 10 minutes, with Kirkman tallying nine of the Cougars points on 3-for-3 shooting overall, including 2-for-2 from beyond the arc.
By the Numbers: For the second-consecutive game, the Cougars finished with at least 20 offensive rebounds, as they grabbed 20 and scored 14 second chance points. While Azusa Pacific struggled to connect from distance in the game, going 5-for-24 (21%) from three, the Cougars were 21-for-44 from two-point range (48%), finishing with 34 points in the paint. The Cougars held Dominican to its lowest field-goal percentage of the season thus far, with the Penguins shooting 33% overall (22-for-67), and the host’s 60 points was 15 below their season average of 75 points per game.
