KAMLOOPS – In what was their final home game of the season, the Thompson Rivers WolfPack women's basketball team was unable to topple the favoured Fraser Valley Cascades en route to the 68-56 loss inside the Tournament Capital Centre.
The Cascades led wire-to-wire on the night but the WolfPack refused to go away and cut the deficit small on multiple occasions, including a
Kyla Smith three-pointer with four minutes left in the third quarter that dropped the lead to just six points. That was as close as the WolfPack would come down the stretch however, as the Cascades pulled away for the victory.
Megan Rouault made a little WolfPack history in the defeat. The fourth year from Vernon's 16 points led the way for TRU and vaulted Rouault into 20th in the program record books with 326 career regular season points. Rouault added nine rebounds to finish just shy of the double-double.
Priyanca Sundher knocked down a trio of long-range shots en route to 11 points while
Danijela Kovacevic tacked on 10.
Deanna Tuchscherer had a dominant outing for the Cascades with 24 points while going 9-19 from the floor. Maddy Gobeil added 15 points and 10 rebounds to round out a balanced scoring effort for UFV.
The contest marked an end of an era inside the TCC as long-time TRU director of athletics and recreation and current interim women's basketball coach
Ken Olynyk coached the final home game of his WolfPack career. Coming out of retirement to guide the team this season, Olynyk has spent 26 seasons as a U SPORTS head coach and 17 as director of athletics and recreation at TRU.
The game also served as the WolfPack's annual Shoot for the Cure fundraiser night. Portions of the proceeds from each ticket sold went to the team's fund for the Canadian Cancer Society with the top topping $1000 raised prior to the game beginning.
With the result the WolfPack wrap up the home portion of their 2021-22 schedule and will now finish their season on the road next weekend at the UVic Vikes and UBC Thunderbirds on Feb. 11-12.
