BAKERSFIELD — The Sky has become the limit around the backboard for the UC Santa Barbara’s women’s basketball team.
Skylar Burke, a 5-foot-8 junior guard, logged her first double-double of the season with an 11-rebound, 15-point performance during Thursday’s 61-57 women’s basketball victory at Cal State Bakersfield.
“It’s wild that she’s our leading rebounder,” said coach Renee Jimenez, noting Burke’s average of 6.6 per game. “That’s huge.
“We have to have a lot of one-and-dones defensively and Sky does a great job with that.”
Burke had flirted with a double-double the previous two games, getting nine rebounds in each.
Senior point guard Alyssa Marin led UCSB (9-5, 3-1 Big West Conference) on Thursday with 20 points. She helped finish off the winless Roadrunners (0-15, 0-5) by scoring nine in the fourth quarter — five on free throws.
Marin moved into fourth place nationally with 104 free-throw makes after converting 11-of-12 foul shots. Her free-throw percentage of .874 ranks 41st .
“The way she can draw fouls and get to the free-throw line is big-time,” Jimenez said. “She can usually get us into the bonus pretty quickly, which is why we’re one of the top teams in the country in free throws (20th with 15.79 makes per game) and in free-throw percentage (second at 81.85%).”
Burke got off to a quick start by scoring seven of UCSB’s first nine points.
“When she’s settled in and can make her reads, she does a really good job of finding her pull-up and settling into those mid-range jumpers,” Jimenez said. “She’s definitely a threat.
“I’ve talked to her a lot, especially at the beginning of the year, about how, ‘Last year you were a role player and now you’re one of the guys,’ so we depend on her every night to be in double figures.
“Alyssa is going to get what she gets. Sky needs to be that next consistent scorer.”
The Gauchos led 28-17 by halftime. They increased the margin to 19 points when a three by Cayla Williams and a layup by Burke put them ahead 53-34 with 5:08 to go.
Williams and Olivia Bradley, both of whom got a late start to the season after undergoing off-season knee surgery, contributed seven points apiece.
“Getting her and Cayla Williams back has really helped,” Jimenez said. “It’s taken Cayla seven, eight games … and Liv is kind of on pace for a couple more before she’s really hitting her stride and just getting comfortable on the floor and moving around, especially defensively.
“But I think Liv will be one of those guys who is in double figures consistently for us.”
Bakersfield cut into the bulk of UCSB’s lead by scoring 26 points in the fourth quarter. The Roadrunners got 10 of them in the final 58 seconds.
“We just haven’t learned how to put our foot on people’s throats,” Jimenez said. “That’s where we’re not ready yet — we’re up 19 with five minutes to go and we just relaxed.
“We didn’t share the ball as well as we did the last game against Hawai’i.
“But when we’re out-rebounding people … We ended up on them by two (30-28), and we’ve got to continue to hang our hat on that.”
It’s how Burke put a cap on the victory.
She blocked a shot by Caitie Gingras with 26 seconds to go and then rebounded it herself. She followed that up with a pair of free throws to give UCSB an insurmountable lead of eight points.
Next up for the Gauchos is a Blue-Green rivalry showdown with Cal Poly at the Thunderdome on Saturday at 4 p.m.