UAA Athletics

Big 3-point shooting carries UAA women to first-round win in final Great Alaska Shootout

For the first time in two seasons, there will be a UAA team playing in a GCI Great Alaska Shootout championship.

The UAA women's basketball team used solid 3-point shooting by a pair of seniors and a clutch performance on defense to defeat Maryland-Eastern Shore 69-59 on Tuesday and advance to Thursday's championship at the Alaska Airlines Center.

Senior forward Shelby Cloninger went 5 of 6 from 3-point land, including 4 of 4 in the first half, and scored a career-high 19 points to lead the Seawolves.

[Making of Mayhem: Inside the Seawolves' signature defense]

Senior guard Kaitlyn Hurley added four treys and 16 points and junior guard Kian McNair tallied six assists and seven of UAA's 14 steals.

"I think Shelby kept us in the game, kept us around and (Hurley) put the nails in the coffin there when the game started to get close and hit some big 3s for us," UAA coach Ryan McCarthy said.

The Seawolves won despite playing without their second-leading scorer, Rodericka Ware, who McCarthy said is suspended for the Shootout for a violation of team rules. The senior transfer from the Academy of Art was averaging 15.4 points per game through UAA's first five games.

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With Ware out, Hurley stepped up with her biggest game of the season. The 5-8 senior filled out the stat sheet with five rebounds, three assists, two blocks and one steal and she went 3 of 5 from beyond the arc in the second half.

"Coach always tells us shooters that the averages even themselves out," said Hurley, who was 5 of 18 from 3 entering the game. "We put in the work so that's going to show eventually. Fortunately tonight was the night."

[Shootout brought big-time college basketball to Alaska, and sometimes into our living rooms]

In the game's opening moments, the Seawolves' up-tempo "mayhem," defense garnered two quick steals and a block by junior forward Hannah Wandersee and UAA went up 5-0 on a Cloninger triple that rocked the 1,974 fans at the Alaska Airlines Center.

But the Hawks quickly stole the lead on back-to-back 3s by Alexus Hicks (10 points) and Maryland-Eastern Shore led for most of the first half.

UAA trailed 30-31 at halftime despite shooting 29.7 percent from the field.

In the second half, the shots started falling.

With the Hawks leading 37-33, a pair of freshmen helped kick start a 15-2 UAA run. Guard Nicole Pinckney nailed a 3-pointer and guard/forward Sala Langi made an old-fashioned 3-point play that put UAA up 38-37 and the Seawolves never trailed the rest of the way.

UAA expanded its lead to nine points on a Hurley 3-pointer that made it 48-39 and things started to get chippy on the court.

Langi and a Hawks player got tangled up on a held ball and after the whistles blew, players on both sides bumped shoulders and a double-technical was called.

UAA's largest lead was 12 points with six minutes to go in the fourth quarter and the Seawolves' lead hovered around the double-digit mark from there.

"I thought UAA kind of outplayed us and was a little tougher, a little more aggressive," said Maryland-Eastern Shore coach Fred Batchelor. "Their enthusiasm and their energy I thought was the difference in the game."

Freshman Bairesha Gill-Miles led four Huskies in double figures with 17 points on 8 of 15 shooting from the field. Most of her shots came from close range and the Huskies outscored UAA 30-18 in the paint.

Langi tallied nine points and Wandersee added six points and seven rebounds for UAA.

The Seawolves will play Tulsa, which beat Binghamton 60-55 in Tuesday's early game, in the championship on Thursday at the Alaska Airlines Center.

McCarthy said it's special to be playing in the championship in the 40th and final edition of the Shootout. UAA last played in the championship in the 2015 Shootout. The Seawolves beat Pepperdine 94-61 in opening round before losing to Western Kentucky 62-58 in championship.

"I know for me as a kid, Thanksgiving revolved around the Shootout and coming with my dad and watching (teams like) UCLA and UMass," McCarthy said. "It's where I fell in love with the game of basketball."

Stephan Wiebe

Stephan Wiebe writes about all things Alaska sports.

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