Last year’s sidekicks are turning into the heroines of this season’s UC Santa Barbara women’s basketball team.
Sophomore Zoe Borter scored a game-high 15 points and junior Skylar Burke notched all nine of her total plus six of her 12 rebounds in the final 7:15 of the Gauchos’ 51-40 victory over Cal State Bakersfield Thursday at the Thunderdome.
“I really had to talk to Zoe and Sky — probably early November — and go, ‘Look, you’re not role players anymore … You’re the guys now, and this is your team and this is your program, and we need you,’” UCSB coach Renee Jimenez said. “I think you’re starting to see with both of them how much we’re relying on them to come up big offensively.”
UCSB (13-9, 7-5 Big West Conference) trailed 38-37 before going on a 14-to-2 run to end the game.
The Gauchos, who trailed by as many as 10 points in the first quarter, held Bakersfield (1-21, 1-11) to only 14 points in the second half. The Roadrunners shot just 25% in the final 20 minutes after a 46.2% first half.
Borter and Burke have served as the Killer B’s for UCSB’s defense all season.
“As a defensive coach, I’m looking for the guys who make me feel safe,” Jimenez said. “They make me feel kind of warm and fuzzy — they’re both extremely dependable on that end of the floor.
“They’re both stepping into roles that they’ve never been in before offensively. I think Zoe played 38 minutes (39, actually) and Sky played 33, and these were kids coming off the bench last year.
“We’re really asking them to do a lot defensively and almost anchor our defense.”
The first quarter was an offensive nightmare for the Gauchos. Cayla Williams hit a three-pointer just 19 seconds after the opening tip, but UCSB’s next basket didn’t come until Borter scored with just 35 seconds left in the 10-minute period.
The Gauchos fell behind 13-3 before two free throws apiece by Olivia Bradley and Anya Choice, followed by Borter’s late basket, trimmed the deficit to 15-9 by the end of the quarter.
“If we were 6-2 and could dunk, we would’ve had 15 dunks tonight, probably,” Jimenez said. “We missed so many layups … I mean, we couldn’t get them any closer.
“There are games where some of those are contested and games like this where they’re wide-open and you’re just happy to get there, but they’ve got to focus and finish.”
Bakersfield’s Ary Dizon made all five of her shots in the first half while scoring 10 of her 12 points.
“No. 4 (Dizon) was killing us inside — she’s a really good player — so we were really trying to give our posts more help inside,” Jimenez said. “I told them to play a little bit more free on defense, try to take some more chances — but smart ones.
“They really ran with that message a little bit.”
UCSB crept ahead by halftime, 27-26, on another three by Williams and a jumper by Jessica Grant.
Borter maneuvered inside to score the Gauchos’ first three baskets of the second half to nudge the lead up to 33-29.
Jimenez, who took over as UCSB’s head coach after last year’s retirement of Bonnie Henrickson, said reviewing last year’s game films didn’t give her full appreciation of Borter’s skills.
“She had such great players around her last year — Whit (Alexis Whitfield) was here, and she was a scoring machine — so Zoe was just kind of the guy who floated around and defended,” she said. “She started toward the end of the year, but I didn’t realize how good she was with her back to the basket.
“That’s where we’ve found a little bit of a niche for her. She can come up with big plays on the offensive end right now.
“She’ll be an all-conference player — if not this year, then next year.”
Grant’s three-pointer boosted the Gauchos’ lead to six points before Bakersfield’s Melissa Secchiaroli answered with one of her own to end the third quarter. Grant finished with 10 points while Secchiaroli led the Roadrunners with 13.
UCSB missed its first four shots of the fourth quarter and surrendered the lead on Secchiaroli’s three-pointer, 38-37.
But Burke put the Gauchos back ahead with a three-point play off Grant’s pass.
She missed her next shot, but Borter rebounded it. Grant found Burke again at the three-point line with another pass and Burke buried the shot to extend the lead to 43-38 with 6:03 to go.
UCSB out-rebounded Bakersfield 40-36. Williams had seven to go with Burke’s career-high dozen.
“When there’s a lid on the basket, you have to find other ways to come up with plays,” Jimenez said. “We kind of challenged them to get on the boards and get second chances.”
The Gauchos made 5-of-6 free throws in the final 69 seconds to keep the Roadrunners at bay. Their 14-of-17 foul shooting helped make up for their 27.3% field-goal shooting (15-for-55).
UCSB leads the nation with its free-throw percentage of .823.
“I felt like we missed a lot tonight … and we only missed three,” Jimenez said. “We don’t shoot free throws in practice at all right now. We’re like, ‘Go shoot four,’ and then we go on to the next thing.
“I’m really not messing with them at all.”
UCSB will aim for its third-straight win when it travels to first-place Hawai’i (16-6, 10-2) on Saturday for a 9 p.m. game (Pacific Time).