SANTA CLARITA, Calif. -- The NAIA’s No. 19-ranked Azusa Pacific validated Saturday’s near-upset on the road at top-ranked Vanguard with a 70-59 victory over The Master’s Tuesday night at Bross Gymnasium, wrapping up the Cougars’ killer back-to-back road stretch.
The Cougars led by as many as 12 points after junior guard Sarah Leathers completed a 3-point play that gave Azusa Pacific a 48-36 lead with 12:36 remaining in the game. However, the next 8 minutes saw the lead dwindle to just a delicate point at 56-55 with 4:42 to play, before Leathers drilled a 3-pointer to briefly stem the momentum for the Mustangs. The Master’s came right back with an Annie Gillespie trey to again close to within a point at 59-58, but senior guard Alyssa Ferdaszewski’s layup and 3 free throws from senior guard Monica Somers sparked an 11-1 run to seal the momentous win for the Cougars.
“We rushed a little bit on our offense and that got us in trouble,” said Cougar head coach Danelle Bishop. “We started taking a lot of outside shots. We’d have one pass against their zone and then shoot, and that hurt us. They also started collapsing on our people inside.”
Leathers misfired on all 5 of her first-half field goal attempts, scoring all 8 of her points and setting up another 3 Cougar buckets in the second half to help preserve the win.
“We were working their zone pretty well,” said Bishop, “and Sarah was attacking their gaps and either shooting or dishing.”
Somers, who entered the game averaging a GSAC-best 20 points per game, scored a game-high 18 points to lead the Cougars in scoring for the 12th time in 17 games this season. Ferdaszewski added a balanced 12-point, 8-rebound, 7-assist performance, and she grabbed a team-high 4 steals. Senior forward Meliame Hala’ufia scored 12 points on 6-of-9 shooting from the field, and junior forward Abby Johnson tallied 11 points and 6 rebounds for the Cougars.
Barely a month and a half ago, the Cougars had started Golden State Athletic Conference play with back-to-back losses, and this week’s visits to perennial GSAC powerhouses Vanguard and The Master’s looked like a hazardous roadblock that could potentially devastate the Cougars’ status as a conference contender. Instead, Azusa Pacific posted an impressive road performance for its 11th win in the past 12 games, setting up the second round of conference play with home games against all 4 of the conference’s standings leaders in the process.
“This is an important win just because we’re coming back from a loss after having a 10-game winning streak,” said Bishop. “We showed a lot of poise down the stretch because we could have gotten down but we didn’t. That’s a sign of a good team.”
All-GSAC guard Kinsley Mittel led The Master’s with a team-high 17 points, including a trio of 3-pointers, and Stacy Nanninga nearly posted a double-double with 10 points and 8 rebounds. Gillespie added 13 points, and Mustang point guard Lisa Chenoweth dished out 6 assists and collected a game-high 6 steals.
With the win, Azusa Pacific improves to 13-4 on the season, 5-3 in GSAC play, while The Master’s drops to 9-5 overall, 4-4 in GSAC. The Cougars host California Baptist Saturday night at 5:30 p.m. before wrapping up the first round of GSAC with a road game at rival Biola on Jan. 23.
