UVIC 71 UBC-OKANAGAN 66
After scorching the UBC-Okanagan Heat on Friday night, the University of Victoria Vikes came out frostier than your favourite pint in your usual watering hole on Saturday.
Coach Craig Beaucamp's men's Vikes managed to stoke the flames in the second and third quarters before scraping out a 71-66 win at McKinnon gym to improve to 2-0 on the young Canada West basketball campaign.
The win hardly went down like a thirst-quenching cold one, but Beaucamp did at least get to savour the two points, building up 32-31 and 52-44 leads after the second and third quarters, but needing late heroics for the triumph.
"Momentum is a precarious thing in sports," said Beaucamp, who was not enthused by the sluggish start. "I'm just happy we found a way to get that win. That's what you have to do in the Canada West.
"When you're playing an opponent back-to-back, crazy things happen and you just have to find a way to get a result. It probably wasn't the way we wanted it, but at the same time we found a way to get the result."
Especially after thrashing the Heat 73-48 the night before.
Up by 15 at one point, the Vikes needed fifth-year guard Michael Acheam-pong to pop in three straight foul throws in the final minute. He then dished off to Terrell Evans for a deuce in the dying seconds to make it 69-66 Vikes. Reiner Theil added two late free throws to end it.
Down 18-11 after the first quarter, Acheam-pong's slam dunk cut it to 20-19 early in the second and the Toronto product added a deuce shortly afterwards as the Vikes grabbed their first lead of the game with 4: 42 to go in the second. Victoria had gone down 11-2 early.
Acheampong finished with 14 points while Evans and Kyle Peterson added 12 each. Azi Fahandeg-Sadi had a game-high 19 for the Heat.
In women's play, the Vikes started with a Jessica Renfrew jump shot, followed it up with a Cassandra Goodis three-pointer, went on an early 9-0 run and easily finished off the Heat 83-52 to move to 2-0 on the Canada West season.
Victoria led 21-4 after the first quarter, led by Jenny Lewis's eight points off the bench in the opening 10 minutes. Jordyn Newman hit a three-pointer to start the second quarter and the Vikes were off to the races as UBC Okanagan struggled with 12 turnovers in the first quarter alone.
Lewis, Renfrew and Jor-dyn Newman finished with 12 points each for Victoria, while Goodis and Tessla Rennie (who fouled out late) chipped in with 10 each as associate coach Dani Sinclair received double-digit performances from five players.
The Heat, without their big shooter Roslyn Huber - who was injured late Friday - struggled for offence early falling behind 21-4 and 41-17 after the first two quarters. The Heat were led by Sarah Allison and Madison Kaneda with 12 each.
"Cassandra had a great game tonight," said Sinclair. "We've been talking to her about taking care of the ball a little bit more and she had, I think, one turnover over the entire weekend. If we can get that from a point guard who is handling the ball all night, that's pretty good."
The Vikes teams will be at the University of Fraser Valley next weekend before returning in two weeks time to play host to Trinity Western. [email protected] Twitter/tc_vicsports
