A rocky beginning would not stop the Vandals on Thursday night.
Idaho overcame a turnover-filled start to take down the Southern Utah Thunderbirds, 74-51. The Vandals have now won nine consecutive matchups with the Thunderbirds.
Idaho (7-10, BSC 3-3) turned the ball over on three of their first four possessions, allowing Southern Utah (3-14, BSC 2-4) to commit to their strength of forcing turnovers and keeping Idaho’s offense from getting set.
Southern Utah came into the game leading the Big Sky Conference in steals, and that showed in the box score. The Vandals set a program record with 28 turnovers on the night.
In spite of the ball control struggles, the Vandals’ offense proved to be too much for Southern Utah. Idaho finished the night shooting 45.6 percent from the field, while Southern Utah managed to sink only 27.5 percent of their shots. Idaho trailed for three minutes of the first quarter and never looked back.
“We did a great job of playing their personnel,” Idaho head coach Jon Newlee said. “We really stuck to the defensive game plan and it was a total team effort, probably our best of the year.”
The Vandals also dominated the glass. Three different Vandals finished with double-digit rebounds, and six players had at least four boards. Idaho finished with 60 rebounds, while Southern Utah mustered only 27.
“Our defense contested their shots well and we did everything we wanted to do,” Idaho junior guard Mikayla Ferenz said. “We forced them into some bad shots and kept them from getting hot.”
Idaho was led by a stellar performance from senior post Geraldine McCorkell. She finished with 25 points and 10 rebounds on 8-10 shooting and did not miss a shot until more than halfway through the third quarter.
After getting into some early foul trouble, McCorkell managed to catch fire and tie her career record with four 3-pointers in the game and tie her season high in points. It turned out to be the 11th double-double of her career.
“We came out with a lot of confidence and were able to do what we wanted to do,” McCorkell said. “We’ll definitely go back and fix the turnovers, but we really put together a great team effort tonight.”
McCorkell, Ferenz and freshman post Natalie Klinker each finished with double-doubles. It was the first such performance of the year for Ferenz and Klinker, while Thursday’s performance was McCorkell’s second double-double of the season. Ferenz finished with 11 points, 10 rebounds, and needed only three more assists for a triple-double. Klinker set career and season highs with 12 points and 12 boards.
“It was good,” Klinker said. “I learn a lot from these guys [Ferenz and McCorkell], and they’ve had a lot of success over the years so there have been plenty of great lessons which have brought us to this point.”
In a break from the season’s pattern, six different players put in double digit minutes and eight different players put in at least eight minutes.
“We’re really trying to develop our post guys in particular,” Newlee said. “Sure, we’re going to see more mistakes, but the development is worth it.”
Idaho will continue the home stand against Northern Arizona at 2 p.m. Jan. 20 in the Cowan Spectrum.
Jonah Baker can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter @jonahpbaker