ASU Women’s Basketball: Four Sun Devils score in double-digits in win over San Diego

After losing back-to-back games to ranked conference opponents, Arizona State (5-2) was able to find the win column again after a 64-55 victory against San Diego (1-2) in the Sun Devils final non-conference game of the season.

It was a total team effort in Sunday afternoon’s contest. Four players reached double-figures in points, including Jaddan Simmons (16), Eboni Walker (14), Taya Hanson (13) and Sydnei Caldwell (12).

“Being able to have diversity and having different people step up and contribute in any way we can, whether it’s offensively or defensively, helps get the job done at the end of the day,” Caldwell said.

This victory makes it 29-consecutive non-conference wins at home for the Sun Devils, a streak that has spanned over the last five seasons.

Despite that, ASU struggled for most of the first quarter. They turned the ball over six times, mostly due to full court pressure of the Toreros.

Halfway through the second quarter, though, Arizona State went on a 9-0 run for its first lead since the opening seconds of the game and the Sun Devils never looked back.

Despite San Diego crawling back into the game at times, ASU was able to keep them at an arms-length and slowly out-work the Toreros on the boards.

Arizona State ended with 43 rebounds, including 17 on the offensive glass and 22 second-chance points. Walker led the team with nine boards, one short of her third double-double of the season.

“I thought (rebounding) was a step forward, having each other’s back,” Turner Thorne said. “We still need to box out a little bit better, but I do think we had a much better effort today.”

In the fourth quarter, ASU relied heavily on their free-throw shooting, going 14-21 (66.7 percent) from the line to help them close out a physical game against a solid San Diego squad.

The Sun Devils will have a chance to rest up for a few days this week before they travel to Utah and take on the Utes on Friday at 3 p.m. MST.