by Kaylee Borden tied a career-high with 25 points to lead four Trailblazers in double figures as Utah Tech women’s basketball opened its five-game holiday homestand with an 81-70 victory over visiting Westminster University on Saturday afternoon inside the Burns Arena.
How it happened
In the first match-up between the former RMAC in-state rivals since Utah Tech’s final Division II season in 2019-20, the sides seemed to pick up right where they left off in a first quarter that featured five ties and three lead changes.
The Trailblazers (4-2/0-0 WAC) owned a 22-17 advantage after the opening 10 minutes following a Maddie Warren 3-pointer and a Borden lay-up in the final moments of the frame.
Westminster (2-2) would open the second quarter with an 8-0 spurt to race out to its largest lead of the day at 25-22 with 7:33 to play until halftime.
Warren halted the Griffin rally with a bucket on the Blazers’ next possession. The redshirt senior guard then drained the second of her two 3-pointers and added a transition lay-in as part of a personal 7-0 run to spot Utah Tech a 29-25 lead just over one minute later.
Utah Tech would push its lead to as many as seven at 37-30 late in the frame, but a 10-foot jumper from former Blazer guard Makeili Ika just before the halftime horn made it a 37-32 game at the intermission.
Clinging to a two-possession lead at 46-40 midway through the third quarter, the Trailblazers finally began to pull away, using a 17-3 run to turn that six-point lead into a 20-point cushion at 63-43 after a Borden basket with 1:19 left in the period.
The Trailblazers scored all 17 points without benefit of one of their patented 3-pointers, though they did manage to convert on three conventional three-point play opportunities.
Borden kick-started the rally with an “and one,” then after a defensive stop, Rose Boisnel followed suit with a bucket and free throw to give the Blazers their first double-digit lead of the game.
Paige Cofer got into the act with one of her own before Borden capped the rally with four-straight points.
Westminster would chip away at the deficit, eventually trimming the Utah Tech lead to nine at 71-62 thanks to a Teuila Nawahine jumper with 5:16 remaining in the game.
However that would be as close as the Griffins would get as Boisnel drained back-to-back 3-pointers, and the Blazers held on from there to earn the hard-fought home win.
