Estimated read time: 3-4 minutes
- Kansas State defeated BYU 92-65, led by Temira Poindexter's 24 points.
- Ayoka Lee contributed 19 points and seven rebounds in just 22 minutes.
- BYU coach Amber Whiting cited team fatigue and travel delays as factors.
PROVO — BYU women's basketball coach Amber Whiting had perhaps the perfect reaction to her team's 27-point loss to No. 12 Kansas State when she walked into the postgame media room Saturday evening.
Temira Poindexter dropped 24 points and Ayoka Lee had 19 points and seven rebounds in just 22 minutes as Kansas State routed BYU 92-65 in front of 2,517 fans at the Marriott Center.
"That was a rough one," she said, unprompted. "I'll just be honest. I thought we looked like ourselves in the first and fourth quarter, but they are a balanced team. They do what they do, and they do it well. ... If you shut down one thing, something else pops up."
Serena Sundell supplied 12 points and 13 assists for the Wildcats (17-1, 5-0 Big 12) to stretch their winning streak to 11 in a row.
But even when Lee — the fifth-year senior and Associated Press preseason All-American who averages 17.1 points and 6.6 rebounds per game — wasn't scoring, her simple presence buoyed the Wildcats at least as much as her 8-of-14 shooting performance.
Then it was up to Sundell, Poindexter and the rest to "make the right play," head coach Jeff Mittie said.
"A lot of attention goes to here," said Mittie, whose team swept its five-day Beehive State road swing that included a 71-47 win over No. 22 Utah. "I think teams start with Lee, and they wanted to obviously be super physical. … There were times when we didn't do as good of a job playing off that gravity, but when we did, we were able to get pretty good shots off that.
"Whether she's scoring or not, she's such a presence. It was a quiet 19 tonight. But she's hard to play one-on-one. If you do, we're fine taking that as well."
Delaney Gibb led BYU (10-6, 1-4 Big 12) with 18 points, seven rebounds, five assists and two blocks. Emma Calvert added 13 points, and Heather Hamson had a career-high 11 points and six rebounds three days after BYU collected its first Big 12 win over Houston.
Of course, all of that was secondary — or at least, it felt so after Kansas State seemingly put the game away with a big second quarter in front of a BYU team that Whiting described as "tired" following a series of travel delays and a virus that has made its way through the roster.
The Cougars played within 3 points, 23-20 of the heavily favored Wildcats through the first quarter by outrebounding Kansas State 12-9 and scoring 7 points with four rebounds and two assists through Gibb.
But BYU opened the second just 1-of-7 from the field, and Kansas State used an 8-0 run en route to leading by as much as 15 on back-to-back 3-point plays by Poindexter and Sundell with 1:51 left in the half.
Poindexter had 19 points in the first half, including a 3-pointer at the buzzer that sent the Wildcats into the locker room with a 50-32 advantage.
"I feel like Serena and the guards were just finding me very well," Poindexter said, "and I was having my feet set, and having my confidence."
Ayoka Lee had 12 points and three rebounds before the break for Kansas State, which took a 23-23 stalemate on the glass — including giving ing up 9 offensive rebounds to BYU — in exchange for the 18-point lead on the scoreboard.
The Wildcats held BYU to 3-of-9 shooting in the third quarter, and connected on 4-of-5 threes on the other end to stretch its lead to 73-40 on Sundell's triple to cap a 23-8 quarter before unleashing the end of the bench in the final 10 minutes.
Kansas State returns to Manhattan, Kansas, to host Arizona and Arizona State next week. BYU is back on the road beginning next Wednesday at Texas Tech (1 p.m. MST, ESPN+).
