Washington State tops No. 19 UCLA 65-61 for Pac-12 title Kennesaw State wins ASUN title, earns first NCAA tourney berth Clark gets triple-double as Iowa blows out OSU for B10 title Williams scores 33, Gardner-Webb women win Big South title Texas Tech suspends Mark Adams over racially insensitive comment Vanderbilt center Liam Robbins out for the season with leg injury

LAS VEGAS. Washington State completed one of the most incredible runs in Pac-12 history by winning its first high school title.

Charlise Léger-Walker scored 23 points and Bella Murekatete added 21 as the seventh-seeded Cougars earned a trip to the NCAA Tournament by defeating No. 19 UCLA 65-61 in Sunday’s championship game.

“I never thought we could do it,” said five-year-old coach Cami Ethridge. “I don’t even think when I got the job I thought it was possible in a league like this.”

Washington State won four games in five days, beating 10th in California, 2nd in Utah, 3rd in Colorado, and finally UCLA.

Leger-Walker brought them to the championship.

“I never thought we would do this,” she said of the downsizing of the network after winning the title. “That moment felt so surreal.”

It’s been a tough season for the New Zealand native, who has returned home twice in a season. Once to see her grandmother Mere Smith when she fell ill, and the second time to attend Smith’s funeral.

Leger-Walker paid tribute to her grandmother on Sunday.

“The whole tournament, I think my grandmother was looking after me,” she said. “It was definitely for her and for my family at home.”

It was the first Women’s Pac-12 Washington State Championship. This will be the Cougars’ third consecutive NCAA Tournament appearance.

Three over with 9 seconds left, Washington State’s Astera Tukhina received part of UCLA’s Charisma Osbourne’s three-pointer. With the arrow pointing in their direction, the Cougars took possession after holding the ball on the bounce, and Tara Wallach hit one of two free throws with 5.1 seconds left to give Washington State a four-point lead.

Tukhina had six assists and Wallach added eight rebounds for the Cougars (23-10).

While the likes of Léger-Walker and Murekatete made headlines, Tukhina’s teammates praised her freshman maturity and poise.

“Ever since she first walked onto campus, we’ve been saying that Astera isn’t a freshman,” Murekatete said. “She has experience, she has IQ – everything about AT – she has a great feel for the game. I’m just so happy and grateful to have her on the team.

“Her poise, the way she reads the defense, how good she is in attack, really helped us with everything we needed at the last moment,” Murekatete added.

Osbourne led the Bruins (25–9) with 19 points. Kiki Rice added 13 points and Emily Bessoir added 11 for UCLA.

“I think we could definitely set up the new screens better, play with the pace, play with the pace,” Rice said. “I think it’s more about whether we can complete our crime and get the views we want to get.”

Washington State shot 22 of 41 (53.7%) from the floor, including 7 of 11 (63.6%) from three-point range. The Cougars were the most efficient team in the tournament, scoring 46.2% (92 out of 199).

UCLA emerged as the tournament’s highest scoring team, averaging 74.3 points on 38.5% shooting after three games, but struggled to find any rhythm from the start, choking on the tournament’s best scoring defense. The Bruins finished 22 of 60 (36.7%) from the floor and 26.3% (5 of 19) from three-point range.

Although they held a four-point lead after one quarter, the Bruins were cold from the start. They shot just 35% (7 of 20) in the first quarter, including 1 of 6 (16.7%) from three-point range, followed by 30.8% (4 of 13) in the second period.

MORE CHARLIS

Léger-Walker set a tournament record with 76 points. In every game, she reached double figures with 23, 15, 15 and 23 points. Her 11 three-pointers were the sixth-highest in a single tournament.

ALL TEAM OF THE TOURNAMENT

Joining Léger-Walker on the All-Tournament team are Murekatete, Rice and Osbourne, along with Emily Bessoir (UCLA) and Cameron Brink (Stanford).

BIG PICTURE

Washington State: The Cougars were the first seed 7 to advance to the Pac-12 championship game. The previous lowest seed to compete in the championship was the No. 6 seed in 2009 (USC) and 2022 (Utah).

UCLA: After holding just two points in the first half on 1-of-6 shooting, Rice solidified the Bruins’ 8-0 start to the third quarter with five points. In the second half, the freshman defenseman hit 4 of 10 from the field.

NEXT

Teams are waiting to be seeded in the NCAA Tournament, and UCLA will definitely receive an entry for the whole.

KENNESAW, Georgia. Terrell Bearden scored 19 points and hit a free throw with less than a second left to rally Kennesaw State and defeat the Liberty 67–66 on Sunday, giving the Owls their first Atlantic Sun Conference championship and their first trip to the NCAA Tournament.

This is a remarkable turnaround for Kennesaw State under the guidance of fourth year coach Amir Abdur-Rahim. The Owls finished with a 1-28 record in 2019-20, Burden’s first season and Abdur-Rahim’s first. They went 5-19 in Abdur-Rahim’s second season and 13-18 last year. Now the Owls will post a school record of 26-8 for their first Big Dance.

Kennesaw State can attribute its win to the defensive work it did with Liberty’s Darius McGee, ASUN’s Player of the Year and all-time conference leading scorer. McGee made just 6 of 21 shots from the floor and 0 of 11 from behind the arc. McGee averaged 22.7 points per game but finished with 14. Kyle Rohde scored a Flames-record 23 points (26–8). The elder hit 9 of 14 shots with four 3-pointers.

Chris Youngblood hit all seven free throws and hit 16 for Kennesaw State. Demond Robinson posted 10 points and 11 rebounds for his fourth double-double of the season. Brandon Stroud added 12 points and six boards.

Rode hit two 3-pointers and hit 11 to put the Liberty at halftime, 29–27.

Kennesaw State bounced back to take a 48–43 lead thanks to a three-pointer from Simeon Cottle with 10:54 left in the game. The Owls remained ahead until Rode hit a 3-pointer to end the series 8–0 to give the Flames a 53–51 lead at 7:43. Youngblood responded with a three-pointer, Burden followed up with a layup, and Kennesaw State regained the lead.

Colin Porter dug in a 3-pointer to take out Liberty even at 66 with 23 seconds left. Porter was fouled on the basket with 0.7 seconds left. He made the first one for the lead and deliberately missed the second one to run out of time.

The competition was the first time that the game at the KSU Convocation Center was broadcast on national television. The Owls triumphed in front of an arena-record crowd of 3,805.

Liberty went 3-0 on their previous trips to the ASUN title match.

MINNEAPOLIS. Caitlin Clark grabbed her 10th rebound for Iowa with 5:18 left in the game and smiled meaningfully for her 10th career triple-double.

All Hawkeyes were smiling all day. Their second consecutive Big Ten Tournament title was closed early.

Clark had 30 points, 17 assists and 10 rebounds for the seventh-ranked Hawkeyes, who extended a 37-point lead to beat Ohio State 105-72 on Sunday.

“It’s a joy,” said coach Lisa Bluder. “Being able to play like that is so much fun and I admire her for it. She’s so competitive, but she loves the game so much.”

Monica Chinano scored 26 points on 11-of-12 shooting—a Big Ten Tournament record percentage—when Iowa (26-6) entered the chat about the No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament for that championship.

Clarke had 23 points in the first half, just one less than Buckcase, who finished 14th (25-7). She pulled back for NBA 3-point wide shots, went all out to the rim to instigate fouls, and delivered a steady stream of laser passes that were as devastating to Ohio’s defense as they were beautiful to an Iowa-dominated team. crowd watch.

“One area where I think she’s really grown is that she reads the floor at an extremely high level,” said Buckeyes coach Kevin McGuff.

An advertised attendance of 9,505 set a single-session Big Ten tournament record, breaking the 2004 Indianapolis championship game between Purdue and Penn State (9,417).

Clarke’s last pass, short of her career high, gave Gabby Marshall a three-pointer with 4:43 left to give the Hawkeyes their 100th point. Shortly before she was replaced, Clarke put her hand to her ear to further piss off her fans. A little later, she was on stage filming a scene where black and gold confetti were showered on the players during the awards ceremony.

The two-time Big Ten Player of the Year recorded the third triple-double in Big Ten tournament history, joining Janelle McCarville (2004, Minnesota) and Amanda Zahui B. (2015, Minnesota). Clarke was first in the championship game.

Most of those passes were pitches to Chinano, who flexed her muscles and maneuvered to pass Coty McMahon of the Big Ten Freshmen of the Year. McMahon slowed down Indiana star Mackenzie Holmes in the Buckeyes’ semi-final comeback from a 24-point deficit.

“Her passing skills are phenomenal, especially in the standing position. She really makes my life so easy,” Chinano said.

Sometimes one glance is enough.

“We just have this kind of telepathy,” Clarke said.

Taylor Mixell scored 24 points and McMahon added 23 points for the Buckeyes, who hit 4 of 18 in the first quarter and never recovered. Without those rolls, they would not have been able to build up the press on the floor that fueled their anti-Hoosiers rally the day before.

After both Indiana and Maryland filed a resume worthy of the No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament, Iowa now has a legitimate goal to do the same. The Buckeyes probably fortified at least the #3 seed.

RIDE HOME SAFELY

Iowa beat Indiana in the championship game last season. The Big Ten hosted the tournament in Minneapolis for the first time this year, and Iowa will be happy to host it there again in 2024.

The Hawkeyes have made Target Center their…