Arizona State women's basketball's comeback falls short vs. Washington State

Arizona State women’s basketball nearly had its first Pac-12 win within its clutches against Washington State on Friday night at Desert Financial Arena.

But a scoreless drought from the Sun Devils (7-13, 0-9 in Pac-12) and seven made free throws on eight attempts edged WSU ahead from ASU’s one-point lead as ASU dropped 61-57 to WSU.

“This is a group that is playing with everything inside of them and like I just told them, keep fighting,” Adair said. “I thought our defense is phenomenal and (Washington State) didn’t score within the last five minutes.”

ASU’s main difference in the first half was falling behind to WSU’s five 3-pointers. The Sun Devils shot particularly well with nine field goals, but couldn’t match the results at the 3-point line. WSU pulled ahead by nine points in the first half, but ASU’s performance in the second half closed the gap.

As the offense started to click with 28 points in the paint, the defense backed it up and forced WSU to make mistakes. In the game, ASU scored 20 points off turnovers.

“We just talked about being aggressive and we’re a team that can get to the line 20-plus times a game and we didn’t have any and that’s an indicator right there,” Adair said. “Offensively, we created the openings in the first half, we were just overpassing or we looked a little hesitant.”

Slowly but surely the Sun Devils are heading back to full health. Forward Imogen Greenslade was available in her first game activated since Dec. 4. ASU had seven players appear in the game and three available players that did not play.

Top plays

ASU’s defense broke ground in the third quarter as WSU committed six turnovers. The Sun Devils were sparked by the play of Isadora Sousa at the end of the quarter where she added a defensive rebound to hold WSU to 15 points.

At one point in the third quarter, ASU shot 6-for-8 and held WSU scoreless through that period.

In the final five minutes of the game, ASU held WSU to 1-of-9 shooting.

Standout performances

Jaddan Simmons played a strong defensive role and helped contain Charlisse Leger-Walker, WSU’s leading scorer. Leger-Walker had only four points in the first half as Simmons consistently pressured her and cut down on her looks. Simmons led the offense with 20 points and had three steals.

Trayanna Crisp played big minutes as a starter and added 11 points on offense.

They said it

“Jaddan is relentless defensively and she gives us balance on both sides of the ball, but we know if we need someone to shut down their premier player, Jaddan never backs away from that assignment.” -ASU coach Natasha Adair on Simmons’ defense.

“I just want to give a big shoutout to Kayla Mokwuah because she was a big leader tonight. Besides from playing, she was like, 'Guys, let’s go'. She was on the bench talking and I think she was our number one leader tonight.” -ASU guard Jaddan Simmons on the team’s leadership.

Up next

ASU will close out its homestand with Washington on Sunday at noon.  The Huskies lost 61-54 at Arizona on Friday.

This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: ASU women's basketball falls in close 61-57 loss to Washington State