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PROVO — When BYU women’s basketball can get a large night from its bench, it’ll take it — like what the Cougars got Thursday in a win over Santa Clara.
But when the Cougars’ backs are against the wall and coach Jeff Judkins needs reliable scoring, he knows where to look.
Morgan Bailey scored 16 of her game-high 26 points in the second half to help BYU surge in the second half and hold off visiting San Francisco, 65-62 on Saturday afternoon at the Marriott Center.
Just as impressive was Bailey on the defensive end, holding San Francisco standout Taylor Proctor scoreless for nearly 15 minutes of the second half. Bailey didn’t allow Proctor to make a shot from the field until the USF star hit a jumper in the paint with 5:48 remaining to cut the BYU lead to 56-51.
“Proctor’s an amazing player. The first half, I didn’t do a good job on her,” Bailey said of the USF star who finished with 20 points. “I wasn’t tough enough. In the second half, Jud just said we all have to be tougher on defense. With her, my mindset coming out was to be physical and make everything hard for her. I had to wear her out.”
Bailey also had 11 rebounds, marking her seventh double-double of the year and third in the past four games for BYU (11-4, 3-1 WCC). The senior post from Timpanogos High School averages a double-double at 17.9 points and 10.3 rebounds per game.
“Morgan’s a great scorer, but she’s really a great defender,” Judkins said. “She doesn’t get enough credit for that. Last year, I used her a lot as my defensive inside-presence defender. This year, we can’t do that as much because we don’t want her in foul trouble. But tonight she changed that role, and that’s why she’s a great player.”
Morgan's a great scorer, but she's really a great defender. She doesn't get enough credit for that. Last year, I used her a lot as my defensive inside-presence defender. This year, we can't do that as much because we don't want her in foul trouble. But tonight she changed that role, and that's why she's a great player.
–BYU coach Jeff Judkins
BYU’s defense held San Francisco to 29.6 percent shooting in the second half. The Dons (9-6, 0-4 WCC) fired away to 55.6 percent from the field in the opening 20 minutes.
“A lot of times, coaches try to get too fancy,” said Judkins, whose team played a mix of man-to-man and zone defense to a 35-33 halftime deficit. “So what a coach does: they go back to where they are comfortable and basic. That was our man-to-man defense. We took the zone off, told our guys to play man-to-man, and we didn’t switch early. It didn’t let them get to the basket as good as they wanted to.”
Lexi Eaton pumped in 18 points, three assists and three rebounds for the Cougars, and Ashley Garfield supplied eight points and 12 boards.
Kylie Maeda chipped in six points and four assists, including three free throws in the final 44 seconds to help ice the game.
“I just heard Juddie’s voice in my head, yelling at me to make the shots,” Maeda said of the pressure-packed final seconds. “He’s been stressing to us a lot this past on our free throws, and we’ve been working on it a lot as a team. We still have a lot of room for improvement, but we’re getting better.”
BYU moved to 3-1 in West Coast Conference play, winning five of their last six games despite battling through finals, Christmas break and a virus that has spread amongst the team.
With four games in eight days to open conference play, the Cougars are looking forward to slowing down and using practice fix Saturday’s 20-of-32 effort from the foul line, among other things. BYU will play at Loyola Marymount and Pepperdine before returning home for a 7 p.m. tipoff Jan. 15 against Pacific.
“A lot of us play a lot of minutes, and we just pushed through,” Bailey said. “We’ve had things that we need to work on, so it’ll be nice when we have these next few practices to work on them.
“Every practice has been just preparing for the next game. Now we can slow things down and work on things that we need to get fixed.”
