No Amira on fire? No problem for the University of Victoria Vikes in a 72-65 sa国际传媒 West women鈥檚 basketball victory Saturday night on Ken and Kathy Shields Court before a lively audience in CARSA Gym.
With their record-setting veteran Amira Giannattasio only shooting five-for-23 on the night, the Vikes got 19聽points from Katie Langdon and 17聽from Aleah Ashlee to move to 3-1 in conference play.
Giannattasio had set a team record for a single game, 44 points, in Thursday鈥檚 triple-overtime 113-108 loss to the Thunderbirds.
But UBC head coach Deb Huband, who as a player captained sa国际传媒 to fourth place at the 1984 L.A. Olympics, is in her 24th season of coaching the Thunderbirds and knows a thing or two about addressing star opponents.
鈥淎mira is an amazing player, but you can鈥檛 get 44 points every night,鈥� Langdon said. 鈥淪he played 55 minutes on Thursday. Everybody stepped up to help tonight. There was a lot of effort from everyone. Everybody played together.鈥�
Giannattasio鈥檚 performance in the previous game eclipsed the former Vikes record of 42 points scored by UVic legend and two-time Olympian Carol Turney-Loos in 1978 against the Saskatchewan Huskies. It was the fourth-highest single-game women鈥檚 hoops points total in sa国际传媒 West history behind former Calgary Dino Meagan Koch鈥檚 49 points in 1996, Koch鈥檚 45 points in 1995, and former SFU Clan star and two-time Olympian Teresa Kleindienst鈥檚 45 in 2002.
鈥淥bviously, [the Thunderbirds] were keying on Amira,鈥� Vikes head coach Dani Sinclair said. 鈥淏ut Amira does more for us than score points and was outstanding in so many other facets.鈥�
Giannattasio, seventh on the Vikes all-time career scoring list, finished with 16聽points.
The Vikes were mismatched inside by the much taller Thunderbirds (2-2), who won the majority of their offensive rebounds, but the six-foot-one Langdon hung tough against UBC鈥檚 boards onslaught. Maddison Penn of UBC provided a real match-up problem for UVic in the paint as the NCAA Div. 1 Virginia Tech transfer scored 17 points and hauled down 11 rebounds to show why she was part of the Australian team that won the bronze medal in the 2013 FIBA U-19 world championship.
But down the stretch, Langdon was money for the Vikes in heavy inside traffic at both ends.
鈥淚 am proud of the way our players battled back from Thursday's loss. I thought we showed a lot of togetherness in this game,鈥� Sinclair said.
The Vikes were again missing key fifth-year player Kristy Gallagher as the Parkland graduate has missed all four regular-season games and remains on crutches with a knee injury.
Meanwhile, the UVic Vikes men鈥檚 team (1-3) fell 87-81 to the U Sports nationally-ranked No. 6 UBC (3-1) Saturday at War Memorial Gym in Vancouver as the Thunderbirds followed up their 89-63 victory on Thursday in CARSA Gym.
Both Vikes teams head to Kamloops for games Friday and next Saturday against the Thompson Rivers Wolfpack.
