Dominant season builds into WAC Tournament title goal

Wednesday, March 11 \| Noon \| WAC Tournament quarterfinal Orleans Arena \| Las Vegas

	GRAND CANYON LOPES (29-2)	vs.	UTAH TECH TRAILBLAZERS (6-24)

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LAS VEGAS – The motivation burns for Grand Canyon women's basketball to claim its first WAC Tournament championship and NCAA Division I tournament berth this week.

The momentum churns with a Lopes team that is soaring into Las Vegas with 27 consecutive victories, the nation's longest active winning streak.

More than anything, the team's talent turned the corner to turn opponents' stomachs.

GCU (29-2) enters a conference tournament of participants who each took lopsided losses to the Lopes twice. One of GCU's 16 conference games was not a double-digit win, and the Lopes won by 25 and 32 against Wednesday quarterfinal opponent Utah Tech, the No. 8 seed that it plays at noon in Las Vegas' Orleans Arena.

Each player in the Lopes' entire rotation is driven on her last college ride, and fifth-year GCU head coach Molly Miller assembled a balanced roster that became the first WAC team in 19 years to put four players on All-WAC teams.

The Lopes lack holes, so much so that last season's national champion, South Carolina, is the only other team in the last five years to shoot at least 49% from the field and 38% from the 3-point line while posting a defensive rating of less than 80.

"I wanna be like, 'Hey, we're still a really good defensive team,' but now both sides of the ball are clicking on all cylinders," said Miller, whose teams traditionally rank among the nation's best for opponent turnovers. "You look at the top statistical categories in the country, and we're still up there. We're still convicted to that side of the ball.

"It's the evolution of any system. Where your weaknesses are, you want to offset those, but you also want to augment your strengths, which is defense. So we didn't skip a beat on that side of the ball, but we definitely were able to fill voids and become a more complete team offensively with the pieces that we added."

Even the unique task of winning three afternoon games in four days has been addressed. GCU already did it twice this season, scheduling those scenarios over Thanksgiving and Christmas breaks at Global Credit Union Arena.

The Lopes have not lost a game since before Wicked hit theaters. GCU lost at Oregon on Nov. 18 and have not lost since then to put itself in position to reach 30 wins for the first time in program history Wednesday.

Defense

Nationally, only Texas (31-2) has a better winning percentage than GCU. The Lopes keep coming at teams with WAC Player of the Year Trinity San Antonio (15.5 points, 5.5 assists and 2.7 steals per game), All-WAC first-teamer Tiarra Brown (GCU D-I era leader in points, steals and blocks) and All-WAC second-teamers Alyssa Durazo-Frescas (nation-leading 4.04 3-pointers per game on 47.1% accuracy) and Laura Erikstrup (14.5 points and 7.1 rebounds per game with 59.7% shooting).

The best compliment Miller hears from opposing coaches is how they are mystified in their approach to a GCU lineup with four stars and a key fifth starter in Callie Cooper, an efficient playmaker and top defender.

"It's really tough to scout when you can't really clog the paint and take away the drive because we've got shooters," Miller said. "You can't really help off a slasher because we have shooters and we have Laura, who is pretty automatic down there. You can't double Laura because we have shooters. Because we have shooters, there are wider gaps for our slashers. This team, probably out of any team I've ever had, the complementary pieces fit together really nicely."

Amid a 27-game winning streak, the Lopes continued to improve and even added a rotation player in Kristyna Jeskeova, who had not played a game in 23 months when she debuted in January after two knee surgeries and rehabilitations.

Alyssa Durazo-Frescas

GCU kept its pressure defense identity with 22.1 opponent turnovers per game, the 10th most in the nation, and the WAC's lowest opponent scoring average (57.9) while also becoming the conference's highest-scoring team (77.6). Both averages are among the nation's top 32.

The Lopes' rotation returned six key players and worked in three impact transfers with all nine knowing they are playing their final college games.

"To see the growth of our and the buy-in of our transfers and how those two have meshed into an upward trajectory for our program, it's been amazing to have a front seat to that," Miller said. "We always say, 'We didn't come this far just to come this far,' and this team really believes in that to achieve our goals.

"They're just locked every moment that we're discussing GCU basketball. They are engaged every moment that we are discussing how to beat the opponent. They are engaged every moment we're talking about culture checks and accountability. That's been a dream come true for a coach when you have a team that will hold themselves accountable and be engaged in every moment."

Wednesday, March 11 | Noon | WAC Tournament quarterfinal
Orleans Arena | Las Vegas

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Players Mentioned

Tiarra Brown

Callie Cooper

Alyssa Durazo-Frescas

Laura Erikstrup

Kristyna Jeskeova

Trinity San Antonio

Grand Canyon University Athletics