Morgan Swaim | Staff Writer
After losing two tightly contested games, 73-68 to Seattle Pacific and 73-66 to Saint Martin’s, on Feb. 22 and 24, the Wolves found themselves ninth in the conference standings as the season ended.
Coming into this week with impressive back-to-back wins, the Wolves had a chance of grabbing the sixth and final spot for the GNAC conference championships. With four teams fighting for the final remaining spot, the margin for error was minimal. After losing by five against Seattle Pacific, the team’s postseason chances were out of their hands. They needed to win their final game, and for other conference opponents to lose their remaining scheduled games on the last day of the season.
Saturday’s game against St. Martin’s was the last for the Wolves season and for five seniors on the team — Jasmine Miller, Kennedy Corrigan, Shelby Snook, Savannah Heugly and Sydney Azorr are all leaving after this year.
The results of the game did not matter in terms of grabbing the last championship spot, as the Simon Fraser Clan was able to grab the final championship berth, finishing the season on a three-game winning streak. This season, the Wolves finished with a 11-15 overall record, going 7-13 against conference foes. That is a three-game improvement from the 2016-2017 campaign.
Next year, the team will be faced with the task of replacing a large number of minutes, with the previously mentioned seniors all leading the team in minutes played. Heugly, Snook and Azorr were huge contributors this year, all averaging double digits in points per game. The team will most likely rely on underclassmen such as first-year guard Keyonna Jones and sophomore forward Natalie DeLonge to play even bigger roles next season, after having both average over 15 minutes this year.
The final stretch of this season may have provided a large amount of experience heading into next season, as the team played with their backs against the walls for a large portion of the second half. Even though the team did not find a postseason berth, the Wolves found themselves in the mix in a jumbled conference and just narrowly missed the cut but will hope to build on the momentum generated at the end of the year for the 2018-2019 season.
Contact the author at mswaim16@wou.edu
Photo by: wouwolves.com
