FRISCO, Texas – The UAB women’s basketball team fell to the top seed in the West, Louisiana Tech, 71-65 in the quarterfinal round of the 2022 Heritage Landscape Supply Group C-USA Basketball Championships on Thursday afternoon.
Zakyia Weathersby led the Blazers (16-15) with 19 points on 8-of-11 shooting and eight rebounds. Margaret Whitley, who had 14 points, scored her 1,000th career point in the contest. Destinee McGhee had 10 points and seven rebounds off the bench.
Keiunna Walker scored a game-high 29 points on 11-of-20 shooting and Anna Lar Roberson pulled down 10 rebounds for Tech (20-10).
The 1st quarter was mostly a one or two possession game. LA Tech had a lead of seven points twice before Weathersby’s buzzer beater made the score 21-16 at the end of the first 10 minutes of play.
Kate Thompson’s free throw gave the Lady Techsters their first double-digit lead at 26-16 with 7:39 remaining in the 2nd quarter. They would see their largest lead of 11 points come at the beginning of the 3rd quarter on Walker’s jumper that made the score 37-26.
And and-1 by Maria Roters got the deficit down to one point with 1:53 remaining at 47-46, but four straight points by Walker gave the Lady Techsters a five-point lead heading into the final stanza.
The Blazers got within one point on McGhee’s layup at 7:21 of the 4th quarter. However, Tech would go ahead eight points with 1:57 to play. UAB got back-to-back jumpers from Weathersby and Whitley, but that was the final points they would score.
“At halftime, we asked the players to leave it all out on the floor, and they certainty did that,” said head coach Randy Norton. “They showed a lot of heart today and I am very proud of them.”
NOTES
- UAB was a prefect 14-of-14 from the free throw line
- Weathersby moved into ninth place on UAB’s all-time rebound list with 735
- The Lady Techsters led for all but 55 seconds, UAB led for 29 seconds, game was tied for 26 seconds
- In her three games against UAB this season, Walker averaged 23.0 ppg
