WOMEN'S BASKETBALL (CANADA WEST)

VANCOUVER, British Columbia – The Trinity Western University Spartans dropped their second game the UBC Thunderbirds 73-57 in Canada West women's basketball action Saturday night at UBC's War Memorial Gym in Vancouver. 

Forward Tessa Ratzlaff led the Spartans with a double-double finishing with 23 points and 10 rebounds, guard Jessie Brown with 10 points and forward Kayla Gordon with nine points and five rebounds added to the Spartan totals. While UBC's Diana Lee with 21 points, Jessica Hanson with 18 points and Kara Spotton with 11 points led the Thunderbirds. 

"There were a few 'morals of the story' we had to work through tonight - it takes four quarters of basketball to win; fighting to get back in a game still requires an additional battle mentality to then be able to win that game, and you can never cut corners on fundamental defense," commented TWU head coach Cheryl Jean-Paul. "We pushed through three quarters and were within reach going into the fourth but then we became spectators to our team-mates struggles on the court and didn't react fast enough to what was happening, both from a coaching perspective and on-court." 

"Despite that, I thought there was a good response to yesterday's loss, a more defined sense of purpose and motivation, and we won a few more three minute stretches, but in the end too many untimely turnovers and a bad stretch of rushed shots ended our comeback." 

Turnovers and foul shooting made the difference for the Thunderbirds. TWU finished with 22 turnovers to UBC's 12, while the Thunderbirds added 16 points (16-18) from the foul line to the Spartans seven points (7-11). 

The Spartans had a strong start to the contest leading 16-9 after a Kayla Gordon layup six minutes into the game. UBC finished the opening quarter with a 10-0 run to lead 19-16 going into the second quarter. 

The T-Birds extended the lead to 12 points at the half, 37-25, by outscoring the Spartans 17-9. 

After a strong third quarter, in which TWU outscored UBC 16-12, the Spartans only trailed the Thunderbirds by eight points going into the final 10 minutes of play. 

It was as close as TWU would get down the stretch as UBC pulled away to take the contest 73-57. 

"I am proud of the team's desire to learn how to compete and recover and win while continuing to teach them that big wins come one good team play at a time. We've seen ourselves do that this year and will continue to work hard to achieve that type of game again," added Jean-Paul. 

The Spartans will continue with road games next weekend as they travel to Winnipeg for two critical games against the University of Winnipeg November 20 and 21. 

Game Notes: Tessa Ratzlaff is currently averaging 18.5 points and 6.5 rebounds per game, while shooting 67.3 percent from the field… 

-TW-