In the months since Amber Whiting has taken over the BYU women’s basketball program, she has not been shy about how she wants her team to play on a particular end of the court.
She wants the Cougars to be a defense-first team. She wants that so much that practices start with defense.
But in her first official game as BYU’s new coach, defense appeared lacking for much of a 82-62 loss to the Colorado State Rams.
The Rams shot 50.8% from the field for the game and 47.8% from the 3-point line. They shot 56.2% in the second half alone.
Colorado State appeared to get whatever it wanted on offense in the second half. Many of the shots the Rams took from the outside were without much duress from the Cougars.
“We started too soft defensively in the second half and allowed them to get easy buckets in the paint and get wide open looks from three,” Whiting said.
BYU led by four at halftime, but Colorado State built a 10-point lead midway through the third quarter and extended the lead to 24 in the fourth.
Arielle Mackey-Williams led BYU with 18 points, while Nani Falatea added 16. Lauren Gustin had 12 points and 13 rebounds.
The game marked the first for BYU under Whiting, who replaced the retired Jeff Judkins. Whiting led her new team to an exhibition win over Westminster last week.
Whiting said she liked the play of Mackey-Williams and Gustin in particular. While it’s a disappointing first outing for BYU, Whiting sees plenty to build on.
“We’re going to focus on the positives tonight and look to build on those,” Whiting said.
