For three quarters Friday night at the Envision Athletic Centre in Abbotsford, the University of Victoria Vikes women's basketball team was sending a message to the Fraser Valley Cascades.
The Vikes were going neck-and-neck with the No. 2-ranked team in Canadian Interuniversity Sport, trailing by just five at the half. The Cascades got the message loud and clear and shifted their game to a higher gear and outscored the Vikes 19-10 in the fourth quarter to down UVic 63-49. The victory improved the Cascades' record to 3-0, while Vikes dropped to 2-1.
"They're a good team, and we got in foul trouble late, and got tired and they took advantage and scored in bunches in the fourth quarter," said Vikes head coach Dani Sinclair, whose club was playing its first road game.
Led by the strong play of veteran guards Cassandra Goodis and Debbie Yeboah, the Vikes tied the Cascades at the half and trailed 44-39 after three quarters. But then Fraser Valley's star forward Kayli Sartori, a 2010 B.C. high school all-star out of WJ Mouat in Chilliwack, took over. Sartori started the fourth quarter with back-to-back three-pointers as the Cascades went on an 11-0 run to start the final frame.
Sartori scored 10 of her 12 points in the fourth quarter.
"They have a lot of firepower, so we wanted to slow their transition game down, and we did that for about three quarters," Sinclair added.
The Vikes were led on offence by Claremont grad Jessica Renfrew's 15 points and Yeboah's 13. Goodis finished with nine points and five assists.
"Jessica had a very strong game under the glass and Cassandra did very well guiding the offence," Sinclair said.
"We just have to play a more sound defence and shoot a little better, and I expect us to do that [today]."
The Cascades, who were playing their home opener after beating the Mount Royal Cougars twice in Calgary last weekend, had four players in double digits, including Aieisha Luyken who had a game-high 17 points, with four three-pointers.
The two teams will play the second half of their Canada West double-header tonight, with a 5 p.m. tipoff.
In the men's game that followed, the unranked Vikes played spoiler in the Cascades' home opener and upset No. 4-ranked Fraser Valley 73-69.
The Vikes stay perfect on the season with a 3-0 record, while the Cascades fall to 2-1. The two teams play again today in Abbotsford at 7 p.m.
