Huskies Win Fifth-Straight, Hold Off Iowa 70-63

Saturday, November 30

San Juan, PR

9:00 AM

University of Washington

6-1

Iowa

5-2

Washington

Iowa

November 30, 2019 | Women's Basketball

Box Score Box Score (PDF)

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico --- Amber Melgoza scored 18 of her team-high 20 points in the second half and Washington fought off a pair of late runs to beat Iowa 70-63 on Saturday morning, closing out the Puerto Rico Clasico with a perfect 3-0 record.

The Huskies pick up their fifth-straight win and improve to 6-1 on the season while dropping the Hawkeyes to 5-2 overall.

Melgoza led the way for Washington with 20 points, scoring 18 in the second half after missing much of the first due to foul trouble. She added five rebounds, three assists and a pair of steals. Melgoza, who had made just one three-pointer this season coming into the game, drained four from beyond the arc—one shy of her career-high of five against Stanford during her sophomore season.

Missy Peterson and T.T. Watkins each added 10 points with Peterson contributing five rebounds and four assists as well.

"I'm really proud of our girls," said Head Coach Jody Wynn. "They withstood Iowa's runs and they have such prolific shooters, but we did what we needed to do to secure the win. After that Tulane loss, to be back in a situation where we had to maintain our lead late, not stop playing at the end and pull out the win was big. We didn't play not to lose today, we played to win. We knew that they were going to be aggressive, but we did enough to get the "W" against a great program and a great coach today."

3-0 in Puerto Rico! ??#AlwaysCompete x #GoHuskies pic.twitter.com/OXYLoK5nBs
— Washington Women's Basketball (@UW_WBB) November 30, 2019

For the second-straight game, Washington jumped out to a big lead then held off charge after charge for the victory.

After Iowa took an early 3-2 lead, the Huskies broke the game open early, using a 13-0 run over a three-minute stretch to go up 15-3 at the 5:38 mark. Watkins and Haley Van Dyke each scored five points over the run with Watkins draining a corner three to put Washington up 12. The Huskies led by 10 before Iowa drained a three-quarter court shot to beat the quarter buzzer and make it 19-12 after one.

Both offenses went cold in the second with the teams combining for just 18 total points. A bucket by Iowa at the 8:17 mark cut the Washington lead to 19-15 before Peterson and Mai-Loni Henson scored on back-to-back possessions to make it 23-15 at the media timeout. Iowa once again closed to within three thanks to a three-point play with 2:22 left, but Peterson drained a three-pointer on the ensuing UW possession, then hit another after a defensive stop and Washington led 29-20 at the half.

In the third, Darcy Rees opened the scoring with a three-pointer to push the Huskies' lead to 12 but Iowa responded with a pair of three-pointers to close to within six. Melgoza answered back with a mid-range jumper then hit a three of her own to stretch the lead back to double figures at 37-26 at the 7:45 mark. Iowa would respond with a 9-0 run over the next two minutes as the lead quickly dwindled to two with 5:47 left.

Khayla Rooks, who hit a career-best five three-pointers on Thursday, drained her first one of Saturday's game, hitting a clutch three to end the run. That triple sparked an 11-0 Washington run which featured three-pointers from Rooks, Melgoza and capped by Watkins to stretch the lead to 13 with 1:00 left in the third. A Henson three with 12 seconds left in the quarter gave the Huskies their largest lead of the game at 14 and Washington led 51-39 after three.

Getting the bench on their ?? @UW_WBB carrying all the momentum into the final quarter of the @prclasico pic.twitter.com/alsYBA6jCS
— FloHoops (@FloHoops) November 30, 2019

Iowa kept its run going to start the fourth quarter, scoring the first three points to close to within single digits at 51-42 with 7:30 left. But the teams went back and forth over the next four minutes. The Hawkeyes were within seven at the 3:51 mark when Melgoza drained her fourth three of the half to stretch the lead back to 10. Then after a quick bucket from Iowa, Rooks would hit another three as well to make it 64-53 with 2:02 to play.

The Hawkeyes closed back to within six after a pair of free throws and a three-pointer to make it 64-58 with 1:25 left, but the Huskies made all six free throw attempts down the stretch to hold on for a hard-fought 70-63 win.

"We really moved the ball and shared the ball well today," said Wynn. "We had 19 assists but had enough turnovers in this game to last us the rest of the season. But the way we share the ball and move the ball left a shooter open. And when we were able to get a shot off, I thought we knocked down a lot of them today. We had big threes by a number of our players. It was a total team effort and we got great contributions by everybody."

Washington shot an impressive 41.4% in the game, connecting on 12-of-29 from three-point range and 12-of-29 on two-point attempts as well. The Huskies also made 10-of-11 from the free throw line to help off-set 26 turnovers in the game. Washington had 19 assists on 24 made field goals with Henson dishing out five helpers to go along with nine points and four rebounds.

The Husky defense continued to play well, limiting the high-scoring Iowa offense—which just racked up 100 points in its last game on Thursday—to just 63 points. It was the fewest points scored by the Hawkeyes this year, who had averaged 80.5 coming into Saturday's game. Washington limited Iowa to 37.1% shooting in the game while forcing 19 turnovers.

Washington's 6-1 record to start the season matches the best start since 1997-98 when the Huskies opened with 10-straight wins. UW has opened 6-1 for the first time under Wynn and for the sixth time since 1997-98.

"I think the thing for us right now is that we are having fun," said Melgoza. "And when we're having fun and not thinking but just playing our game—just playing basketball—and knowing that we can go out here and battle against some good teams, I think we don't stress about it and it just comes to us."

Washington takes a bit of a break, returning to action on Sunday, December 8, hosting Hawaii at 7:30 p.m. at Alaska Airlines Arena.