LARAMIE, Wyo. (UNLVRebels.com) - The UNLV women's basketball team completed a comeback to force overtime and defeated Wyoming 63-60 at Arena Auditorium on Wednesday night.
Amarach Kimpson led the Lady Rebels (23-2, 13-1 MW) with 16 points by shooting 6-for-9 from the field, was a perfect 3-for-3 at the free throw line and hit one three-pointer.
Desi-Rae Young was second on the squad with 15 points.
Alyssa Brown had a career night under the hoop bringing down 19 rebounds (three offensive, 16 defensive).
Wyoming (14-11, 9-5 MW) was led by McKinley Dickerson and Emily Mellema who each put up 14 points. Allyson Fertig, who is the Cowgirls leading scorer, added 12 points tonight and had 12 rebounds.
THE FOURTH QUARTER COMEBACK: The Lady Rebels trailed by six, 41-35, heading into the final 10 minutes. The Cowgirls made the first bucket of the quarter, but Young made two free throws to cut the deficit back down to six.
Ashley Scogging drained a three-pointer to get UNLV within five, 45-40, but Wyoming made a layup to get ahead by seven.
Nneka Obiazor sank one from long range to get the bench hyped and the Lady Rebels back within four, 47-43. Kimpson made her way through the paint and threw up a layup that sank and had UNLV within two, 47-45. With 3:11 left on the clock, the Lady Rebels started an eight-point scoring run, which included Kimpson hitting the game-tying basket to send the game into overtime at 53-all.
OT VICTORY:
Kiara Jackson sank the first basket of the extra five-minute quarter to give the Lady Rebels a 55-53 lead. UNLV and Wyoming went back-and-forth until Young made a free throw to extend the lead by five, 63-58. The Cowgirls made two free throws to get within three, 63-60. UNLV took a 30 second time out with eight seconds left to play, and after a missed basket by the Lady Rebels, the Cowgirls tried to make a three-pointer and missed and UNLV brought down the rebound to hold onto the victory.
OTHER NOTES
- UNLV collected the regular season sweep over Wyoming. Additionally, the Lady Rebels have won back-to-back road games against Wyoming.
- There were three lead changes and five times that the Lady Rebels and Cowgirls were tied.
- The Lady Rebels have now won eight straight games and have a 17-0 road MW streak.
- UNLV's bench out-scored Wyoming's bench 31-16.
- The Lady Rebels out-rebounded the Cowgirls 48-37.
- UNLV had a season-high seven blocked shots including Alyssa Brown with three, which is a season-high.
- This was the first overtime game of the season for the Lady Rebels.
HIGHLIGHTS
UP NEXT: The Lady Rebels will travel north of Las Vegas to visit in-state rival UNR on Saturday, Feb. 24 with tipoff at 6:30 p.m. and will be televised on Fox Sports 1. The game is part of the Silver State Series, presented by America First Credit Union.
