UAA women take fourth place in Great Alaska Shootout

The University of Alaska Anchorage women’s basketball team fell Wednesday to NCAA Div. I opponent Missouri State in the Great Alaska Shootout.

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UAA Head Coach Ryan McCarthy shouldered the blame in the Seawolves’ 58-65 loss.

“I think at the end of the day, this is my fault,” McCarthy said in the post-game press conference. “We had 21 turnovers and we weren’t focused from that standpoint, and I own that.”

“You know, I think we’ve gotta’ be honest with ourselves and look at what we need to do better in the future if we’re gonna’ be talking about championships and things like that, and that starts with me,” McCarthy said.

The Seawolves took second place in the NCAA Division II National Championships last season.

McCarthy said a lack of consistency was his team’s biggest flaw.

“You know, once we get the mo’ we do something to shoot ourselves in the foot,” McCarthy said. “We just couldn’t put two and three plays together.”

“We’d make a big play and then have a turnover or not execute a set that we’d worked on a million times.”

McCarthy said with senior forward Autummn Williams injured and not in the lineup, UAA was playing shorthanded.

“We were coming out limping and we held them off for as long as we could,” he said. “They were just a little deeper than us.”

Two different Seawolves, sophomore guard Tara Thompson and freshman guard Yazmeen Goo, played more than 30 minutes on Wednesday, which McCarthy said is a rare occurrence.

Thompson and junior forward Shelby Cloninger led UAA in scoring with 15 points each.

The Seawolves took fourth place in the tournament, behind three NCAA Div. I opponents..