Posts tagged Arielle Roberson
CU Women’s B-ball Team Beats Oregon St. Beavers in Annual Pink Game
Feb 9th
Story by Caryn Maconi, CUBuffs.com
University of Colorado senior guard Chucky Jeffery earned her 1,500th career point and 26th career double-double Friday night in a 61-47 win over Oregon State.
It was a long-awaited return to the Coors Events Center for the Buffs, who wrapped up a four-game California swing with a split against UCLA and USC last weekend.
The CU women wore pink-accented uniforms in honor of the annual “Play 4 Kay” game to support breast cancer awareness.
“It was breast cancer week, and coach talked about attacking because that’s what the women with breast cancer have to do,” said junior guard Brittany Wilson, who grabbed a game-high five steals. “They have to attack, they have to fight. So we came down, we attacked, we came after loose balls, and forced them into those (24) turnovers.”
CU put the heat on the visitors early on, going on a 9-0 run before OSU scored its first basket of the game with 14:09 left in the half.
Wilson said that solid start was crucial for the Buffs, as they were battling a strong defensive team ranked sixth in the nation in blocks at 6.1 per game.
“We knew we had to come out and set a statement or they would keep coming at us,” Wilson said, “and you can’t give a team like that confidence.”
But the Beavers answered back, hitting four three-pointers in five minutes to make it 21-16 with six minutes remaining.
Thanks to a solid 78.6 percent on 14 opportunities from the free throw line, CU was able to hold onto that narrow lead and enter intermission still up five (28-23).
“Oregon State is a good team, they hustle and they scrap the entire game,” Jeffery said. “They weren’t going away, so we knew we had to go on a run and we had to get it up a little bit … that was huge for us to get this win.”
The second half began in a similar fashion as the first, as the Buffs went on a 7-0 run with five straight points by Jeffery and two made free throws by forward Arielle Roberson.
This time, though, the momentum stuck.
Colorado built its largest lead of the game, 15, with eight minutes left on the clock. From there, the Ducks would not pull closer than eight.
Shooting 7-of-10 free throws to end the game, the Buffs widened the gap back to 14 and closed with a 61-47 victory.
Jeffery led the Buffs in scoring with 22 points, adding 11 rebounds and a season-high three blocks. Sophomore forward Jen Reese also scored in double figures with 10 points, while Roberson added nine.
Guard Jamie Weisner was the biggest force on the court for the Beavers, as the freshman scored 22 total points and added seven rebounds; she was the only OSU player with more than seven points.
“Weisner’s tough,” said Colorado head coach Linda Lappe. “She plays so hard, she’s physical, she never quits. She’s a tough matchup for anybody in the league, so you’ve got to give her a lot of credit. She kept them in the game.”
With the win, CU improves to 17-5 overall, 6-5 in the Pac-12 Conference, while OSU falls to 9-14 and 3-8 in conference play.
Colorado returns to the Coors Events Center Sunday at 1:30 p.m. to take on the University of Oregon. After falling to Utah 67-47 Friday night, the Ducks are ranked last in the Pac-12 with a 1-10 record in the conference.
In fact, the Buffs have just one opponent remaining in the regular season, Washington, that is currently ranked higher in the conference standings.
Wilson, however, said her team won’t get comfortable just yet.
“Being in the Pac-12, you never know what team is going to come out,” Wilson said. “You have to play every team and respect them. This is a bottom-to-top hard conference to play, and if you give a team confidence, they’ll keep shooting and keep coming back at you. You don’t want to relax too much.”
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Strong Second Half Pushes CU Women Past USC Trojans, 65-49
Feb 3rd
It’s been a tough road trip for the No. 22 Colorado women’s basketball team, with three straight road losses against nationally ranked opponents in the past two weekends.
On Sunday, though, the CU women had one last chance to pull out a road win over the Southern California Trojans — and this time, they made it happen.
With a solid second-half effort on both sides of the ball, Colorado pulled away from the Trojans for a 65-49 victory.
“I really liked our toughness in this game,” said Colorado head coach Linda Lappe. “We didn’t have any of that on Friday, and so it was nice to kind of get our identity back because that’s who were are when we’re playing our best.”
It was a success that came at a much-needed time, as the Buffs were in the midst of their longest losing streak of the season. After falling to top-10 teams Cal and Stanford last weekend, Colorado shot less than 30 percent from the field in a 62-46 loss to No. 18 UCLA on Friday.
“I think we knew we could definitely win this game and that we had to win this game,” said redshirt freshman forward Arielle Roberson, who led the Buffs in scoring with 16. “We just knew we had to do it in a fun way and not make it too stressful.”
The stress was certainly still there in the first half, as the Buffs and Trojans traded baskets and both teams struggled to gain a solid advantage. The lead changed eight times throughout the half, and neither team went up by more than five.
In the four minutes before intermission, however, USC found its momentum and went on a 13-3 run to reverse Colorado’s five-point lead to a five-point lead of its own by halftime (31-26).
The Buffs shot 36 percent from the field in the first half compared to USC’s 33, but the Trojans were efficient from the line with an free throw percentage of 89.
Colorado, though, took control at the start of the second half, going on an 8-0 run and forcing five turnovers in the process to build a three-point lead.
“I kind of had a feeling that (the Trojans) were going to get tired in the second half,” Lappe said. “And I think that’s what happened. I think we pushed the ball really well at them in the first half, we were physical with them in the first half, and I think that wore on them in the second half.”
With 12:17 remaining, Roberson knocked down an “and-1” play to put the Buffs up eight (41-33). Four minutes later, senior guard Chucky Jeffery scored on a steal and a fast break to give CU a 10-point lead.
In the final two minutes, Colorado went on an 8-1 run capped by a Roberson trey and a Jeffery free throw, erasing USC’s chance for a late-game comeback.
By the final buzzer, the Buffs had gone up 16 for a 65-49 victory.
Lappe said the improvement her team made from Friday night’s struggle to Sunday’s success was indicative of a high-level team.
“Everybody has a bad game, championship teams have bad games,” Lappe said. “But the real championship teams respond in a great fashion. They can let it go, they can take it for what it’s worth, and they can get a little mad and come back even stronger. I think that’s what’s going to happen to us after that Friday night game.”
Colorado demonstrated its depth in both scoring and rebounding on Sunday, with four players scoring in double figures and six players grabbing five or more boards.
In addition to Roberson’s game-high 16 points, Jeffery scored 15 and grabbed 10 rebounds in the process for her fifth double-double of the season. Junior guard Brittany Wilson added 12 points, while sophomore guard Lexy Kresl scored 11 and grabbed six rebounds.
Overall, the Buffs out-rebounded the Trojans 44-29, with 13 of those on the offensive end. Colorado ended the game shooting 40.4 percent from the field, holding USC to just 27.5 percent.
Junior forward Cassie Harberts led the Trojans in scoring with 14 total points, below her average of 18.7, while sophomore guard Ariya Crook added 10.
The win bumps Colorado’s record to 16-5 overall and 5-5 in the Pac-12 Conference, while USC falls to 8-13 and 5-5 in conference play. The Trojans remain unsuccessful against ranked teams (0-6) so far this season.
Though the Buffs may be only .500 in conference play, their start to the season has been far from smooth sailing. Half of Colorado’s matchups so far in conference play have been against nationally ranked opponents, and four of those have been against top-10 Cal and Stanford teams.
Only one of Colorado’s next eight opponents, Washington, currently has a better record than the Buffs in the Pac-12.
The CU women return to the Coors Events Center next week with matchups against Oregon State on Friday and Oregon on Sunday.
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CU Women’s Comeback Falls Short Against No. 6 Cardinal
Jan 28th
STANFORD, Calif. – The Colorado women’s basketball team encountered another in-game lapse on Sunday against Stanford, rallied from it, but couldn’t finish its comeback and fell 69-56 to the No. 6 Cardinal at Maples Pavilion.
The No. 20 Buffaloes held their own for most of the first half, staying within single digits of the Cardinal by halftime (35-26). That gap could’ve been smaller, however, had the Buffs not given up 10 first-half turnovers and allowed the Cardinal to go on a 9-3 run to cap the first half.
Colorado didn’t regain its momentum until midway through the second half, and with 14:25 remaining, Stanford had already built a 21-point lead from which CU could not recover. That slow second-half start, CU head coach Linda Lappe said, was reminiscent of another scoring drought the Buffs had the last time they played Stanford – a 57-40 loss on Jan 4.
“In both games that we’ve played these guys, we’ve had a stretch where we have not played very well, and we’ve just given them way too many opportunities,” Lappe said. “We weren’t making them work to get that 21-point lead, and that’s probably the most disappointing thing, in both games. Last time it was at the beginning of the game, this time it was right before half into the second half.”
With the loss, the Buffaloes drop to 15-4 overall and 4-4 in Pac-12 Conference play, while Stanford improves to 18-2 and 7-1 in the Pac-12.
The two teams were ranked No. 1 and 2 in the conference in scoring defense entering the game, with the Buffs holding opponents to 52.7 points per game and the Cardinal 52.9. On Sunday, though, Stanford’s defense prevailed, forcing 18 Colorado turnovers.
Despite its ineffective opening to the second half, CU had nearly 15 minutes to play and wasn’t about to give up. The Buffs brought themselves back into contention with a 12-0 run, trimming the score to 51-42 with 10:45 remaining. The Cardinal’s lead eventually shrunk to just seven (53-46) as Brittany Wilson hit a three with eight minutes on the clock.
But every time Colorado brought the energy, Stanford responded. With 6:10 remaining, Stanford made what turned out to be a five-point play: forward Joslyn Tinkle hit a three-pointer, and missed her “and-1” shot, which forward Chiney Ogwumike rebounded for a layup.
It was the spark the Cardinal needed to bring the game home.
“We didn’t close out with our high hands, we run into the shooter and then we don’t box out on the free throw, and that was a huge deal at that point in the game,” Lappe said. “It gave them a lot of momentum.”
Though the Buffs kept fighting, they would never get closer than 10 points.
Lappe said that while Stanford brought a high level of play to the game, many of the Buffs’ mistakes were of their own creation.
“We didn’t do nearly enough that it was going to take to win tonight,” Lappe said, “and I felt like we controlled a lot of that.”
But junior guard Ashley Wilson, who scored five of her seven points during CU’s second-half comeback attempt, said her team had to feel that a win was still possible until the final buzzer.
“It’s just never giving up. No matter what position we’re in, we have to fight, fight ’till when the horn goes off,” Wilson said. “We’ve just got to be ready to bounce back. That’s all we can do every single time is bounce back and not let it defeat us.”
Sophomore forward Jamee Swan led Colorado in scoring with 14 points off the bench, while senior guard Chucky Jeffery added 13. Jeffery and redshirt freshman forward Arielle Roberson grabbed a team-high seven boards each, helping CU to out-rebound the Cardinal 39-33.
Stanford’s Ogwumike led all scorers with 20, adding 12 rebounds to earn her 15th double-double of the season. Three other Stanford players – Tinkle, guard Toni Kokenis and guard Amber Orrange – also scored in double figures, as the Cardinal hit 49.1 percent from the field compared to CU’s 36.1 percent.
Colorado has now played both of the Pac-12’s top-10 teams, Cal and Stanford, twice each, with those four games being the Buffs’ only conference losses.
Ashley Wilson said there were definite benefits to taking on such tough competition early in the season.
“We know we can play with the top teams in the country, we’ve proven that multiple times,” Wilson said. “So now we just have to take this confidence, take the positives out of this game and just let it keep rolling into the next few games.”
CU plays the third of four straight away games on Friday night against UCLA. The matchup is set for 9 p.m. MST and will air on the Pac-12 Network.
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