HOUSTON (AP) — Jalen White scored 16 points as Texas A&M-Corpus Christi easily beat Houston Baptist 94-70 on Saturday.
Nolan Bertain and Myles Smith added 15 points each for Texas A&M-Corpus Christi (5-19, 2-13 Southland Conference), which ended its four-game losing streak. Smith also had eight rebounds and Simeon Fryer had 11 points
Pedro Castro had 17 points for the Huskies (5-18, 4-11). Za-Ontay Boothman added 14 points and Brycen Long had 12 points.
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This was generated by Automated Insights, http://www.automatedinsights.com/ap, using data from STATS LLC, https://www.stats.com
After Washington State freshman Efe Abogidi sank a 3-pointer to seal a triple-overtime win over Stanford, teammate Aljaž Kunc said “there's more to come” from the 19-year-old Nigerian.
Scouts seem to agree as Abogidi has quietly played his way onto the NBA draft radar. That was always the plan, but after introducing himself nearly four yours ago with a free throw-line dunk that became a social media hit, Abogidi practically disappeared Down Under.
The high-flying Abogidi, who plays forward and center for the Cougars, was grounded for more than two years after badly injuring his left knee in a June 2017 game at the NBA Global Academy in Canberra, Australia. He tore his ACL, MCL and meniscus and underwent the first of three surgeries.
“I wasn't really thinking about playing basketball. I was just focused on getting my leg back on track,” Abogidi said in an interview with The Associated Press.
“I'd see my team training every day, I just felt left out sitting on the sidelines for two years. It just gets in your head, makes you feel like you don't love the game you used to love before. But after my first practice back, I thought, I still have a little stuff in me, I could go harder, I could take this a lot further.”
Abogidi has started all 26 games for the Cougars (14-12, 7-12), averaging 8.9 points, 7.3 rebounds and 1.3 blocks per game as they prepare for the Pac-12 Tournament. In late December, he was the conference's freshman of the week, an award dominated by expected lottery pick Evan Mobley of USC.
The campus in Pullman is a long way from Ughelli in southern Nigeria, where as a 12-year-old boy Abogidi played pickup games on the town's lone court, featuring a crooked rim and no net.
As he grew, his sneakers were too small but he kept wearing them until...
LAS VEGAS (AP) — Trinity Baptiste had 13 of her 17 points in the first half, and No. 11 Arizona beat Washington State 60-44 in the quarterfinals of the Pac-12 tournament on Thursday night.
Arizona will face ninth-ranked UCLA in the semifinals on Friday.
The second-seeded Wildcats (16-4) pulled away with an 11-0 run in the third quarter capped at 42-24 on Aari McDonald’s layup with 1:42 left. Washington State got the deficit no closer than 14 the rest of the way.
The No. 7 seed Cougars (12-11) had 20 of their 26 turnovers in the first half but only trailed 29-21 at the break.
Baptiste led the defensive pressure with six of Arizona’s 16 steals and made 8 of 11 shots from the field. Aari McDonald added 13 points, nine assists and five rebounds.
McDonald reached her 86th game in a row scoring in double digits when she scored on a layup with 7:03 left in the fourth quarter.
Cate Reese added 10 points for Arizona, which held Washington State to five points in the first and third quarters.
Charlisse Leger-Walker had 12 points and Krystal Leger-Walker scored 10 for the Cougars. Bella Murekatete had 10 rebounds for Washington State, which shot 26% for the game.
Washington State finds itself on the NCAA Tournament bubble after going 3-6 against ranked opponents, including a pair of wins against No. 9 UCLA.
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LAS VEGAS (AP) — Michaela Onyenwere scored six of her 12 points in the fourth quarter to help No. 9 UCLA hold off Washington for a 58-46 victory on Thursday night in a Pac-12 quarterfinal.
Charisma Osborne also had 12 points and 10 rebounds for the Bruins (15-4), while Lauryn Miller had nine points and Natalie Chou added seven.
UCLA staved off upset-minded Washington, which pulled within three early in the fourth but couldn’t gain enough momentum to seize control of the game.
“We are a much-improved shooting team than we were a year ago, but it is still not the preeminent part of our success,” UCLA coach Cori Close said. “Our success is built on defense, rebounding and passion plays. And passion plays are nonstatistical hustle plays that we believe are the intangibles that lead us to high levels of play and help us survive bad shooting nights.”
Quay Miller had a game-high 19 points with seven rebounds, while Tameiya Sadler chipped in 12 for Washington (7-14).
The Huskies were dealt their biggest blow when coach Jody Wynn said leading scorer Haley Van Dyke couldn’t return to the game in the second half after hitting her head on the court. Van Dyke, who averages 12.5 points and 6.0 rebounds per game, had just two points in 17 minutes in the first half.
“Haley’s led us all year long,” Wynn said. “She’s led us from the moment she showed up on campus in the Fall. She’s one of our most experienced players. When she went down and wasn’t able to come back to the court with us and fight, it kind of rattled us for a little bit.”
Wynn said it also brought the team together and motivated the Huskies to rally within three, at 44-41 with 8:22 left in the game.
But under UCLA’s defensive pressure, the Huskies missed their next four shots and turned...
LOS ANGELES (AP) — California Baptist has the longest current winning streak in Division I women's basketball and is only the fifth school since 2016 to go unbeaten through its first 20 games. But you won't be seeing the Lancers when the NCAA Tournament bracket is released March 15.
That's because the private Christian school in Riverside, California, is in its third season of a four-year transition phase to full Division I membership status. California Baptist made the jump from Division II in July 2018 but is not eligible to participate in an NCAA tournament in any sport until the 2022-23 season.
“I’m not gonna lie, it feels like a bit of a letdown,” senior guard Georgia Dale said. “Everyone’s big thing is going to the big dance and seeing how far they get in March. And it feels like a bit of a punch in the face knowing that we can only go so far.”
The Western Athletic Conference regular-season champions won't see their season end, though, after next week's conference tournament in Las Vegas. Women's NIT organizers are planning to invite the Lancers to be part of their 32-team field.
The Lancers go into Friday's game at Seattle with a 23-game winning streak dating back to last season. Victories over the Redhawks on Friday and Saturday would make them the 24th team since 1982 to go through the regular season undefeated and the first since both Mississippi State and UConn did it in 2017-18.
If California Baptist can make it undefeated through next week, it would join UConn, Tennessee, Baylor and Notre Dame as programs to go unbeaten in the regular season and win the conference tournament. The Huskies were the last to do it in 2018.
Unfortunately, the Lancers would also become the first team since Oral Roberts in 1983 to go unbeaten and not receive an...