The Bellevue College women’s basketball team hit a slight road bump these past two weeks, losing two of their last four games, including a 72-69 upset by the 6-12 Whatcom. Still, they took care of business by beating down the 3-12 Everett behind 23 points each from Sav Huerta and Brianna Byrnes before losing a close 66-59 bout at home against Skagit Valley on Jan. 25 to even themselves up in the standings.
Still, by far the most impressive outing of late was an 80-72 drubbing of the second-place Everett, watching Huerta drop a menacing 28 points on a 9-24 shooting. At 19.8 points per game, she remains at the top of the conference and shows no signs of stopping. She was joined in success by Gwen Aasland, whose 18 points were second both on the team and in the game, which she achieved while collecting a whopping 14 rebounds.
The key to their success has been generating free throw opportunities and delivering on them. While Edmonds went just 5-10 from the free throw line, the Bulldogs shot 27 of them and made 23. This has been a season-long trend as BC lands fifth in made free throws this year and sixth in attempted free throws. They are the easiest points to come by, and teams that can generate them more than others will find that translating into success. For example, Lower Columbia, who leads the conference in free throw attempts this year at 386, is sitting pretty at 14-5 overall.
The men’s team has had contrasting results this past week. They got thwarted 82-69 by Edmonds before annihilating the 4-13 Whatcom 99-76 thanks to a combined 46 points by Sayerr Senghore and Owen Moriarty. They then lost 78-65 to Everett before bouncing back again against Skagit Valley in a 94-92 thriller. An Aydan Janssan layup with five seconds remaining gave him 20 points in the game and gave Bellevue College the win.
Moriarty in particular has been a revelation, going for 23, 24 and 28 points in his last three games on solid percentages. His 19.5 points per game are just outside the top 10 in the conference. This is largely contributed to by his impressive 40 percent three-point shooting over the course of the season.
Notably, the Skagit Valley game on Jan. 25 also marked the return of Prophet Johnson to the court for the first time since Jan. 6. Johnson scored 23 points, and his average of 23.8 would place second in the conference if he had enough games played to qualify. Nevertheless, the Bulldogs lost three of their last five without him, so his return should mean good things going forward.
Next up on the schedule for BC basketball is a home matchup against Olympic to kick off the month of February.
