Gonzaga women dominate boards, jump out to early lead and roll past San Diego 69-43

The Gonzaga women made it look easy Saturday afternoon at San Diego.

Dominating on the boards and almost everywhere else on the court, GU took a big early lead and coasted to a 69-43 West Coast Conference win over the Toreros.

The Zags jumped out to early leads of 10-4, 27-9 and eventually 36-15 at halftime to sweep the season series with the Toreros and remain in a first-place tie with BYU in the loss column.

Gonzaga improved to 16-4 overall and 7-0 in the WCC going into a three-game homestand.

The Zags have won six consecutive games since a 66-50 setback at second-ranked Stanford on Jan. 9. That was also Gonzaga’s last loss since Dec. 19.

GU has held opponents to less than 60 points in four consecutive games.

“Our team did a really good job defensively,” coach Lisa Fortier said. “I don’t know if we’ve done as good a job of defending against tendencies, as we did of the game. … For three quarters, we did a good job of keeping them to their weak hands, helping where we could help and crowding the shooters.”

All that effort produced some remarkable stats against a team picked to finish third in the conference. For the game, GU held the Toreros to 25% shooting (14 for 56).

Already one of the top rebounding teams in the nation (plus-10.6 going into Saturday’s game), GU will only go up from there after owing the boards 46-24.

There was also a lot to like on the offensive end. Senior guard Cierra Walker had a career-high 21 points after making 6 of 10 shots from long range.

Fortier, however, saw some room for improvement ahead of Saturday’s showdown with No. 16 BYU.

“They pressured us into too many turnovers (25 ) and we had some poor communication at times,” Fortier said.

Gonzaga forced 17 turnovers by USD, which lost its sixth straight game to drop to 10-10 overall and 1-6 in the WCC.

The game was a marked improvement for GU over the teams’ first meeting two weeks earlier in Spokane. In that contest, the Zags almost blew an 11-point lead before clinching it at the foul line.

The Zags got 14 points from point guard Kayleigh Truong and 12 from her backup, sister Kaylynne.

Forward Melody Kempton had nine points and a game-high seven rebounds

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Jordyn Edwards had a game-high 20 points for the Toreros.