Cardiac Trojans secure two more WNIT wins

Brady Fitch photo

Shaulana Wagner handles the ball against North Dakota State.

“The will to win can’t be beat,” said head coach Chanda Rigby after a Thursday night win over the North Texas Mean Green in Trojan Arena.

Troy women’s basketball used that will to win two overtime thrillers, an 88-86 win over North Texas Thursday night and a 97-88 win at North Dakota State, to advance to the Women’s National Invitational Tournament Fab Four for the second year in a row.

Cheers echoed through Trojan Arena late Thursday night as the Trojans took a hard fought 88-86 win over American Athletic Conference foe North Texas. Senior guard Ashley Baez secured the win for the Trojans when she downed two free throws with 0.2 seconds left after getting fouled.

“We had some key turnovers and lost focus but at the end of the game, our crowd really helped us pull through and the players fought with all their emotion and belief,” said Rigby.

Sun Belt All-Conference forward Zay Dyer led the way for the Trojans with 23 points while hauling in 13 rebounds. The fifth of those rebounds was a record breaker for Dyer as she grabbed 363 rebounds on the season, a new single season record at Troy.

The seniors of Troy continued to go off, as guard Shaulana Wagner notched 17 points with 10 assists to have her own double-double. Behind her came two more seniors, as Briana Peguero and Brianna Jackson both contributed 14 points to the winning efforts.

Jackson also batted down eight Mean Green shots to finish one block off of the Troy single game record of nine. Emani Jenkins rounded out the double-digit Trojans as the junior scored 10 points, including the free throw to tie the game and force overtime.

It with a rough start for both teams in Trojan Arena as the score read 1-0 in favor of North Texas three minutes into the game. The offense started to pick up throughout the quarter though, with a Troy 9-0 run giving the Trojans momentum.

The Mean Green kept pace, capturing a brief 14-12 lead before the Trojans went running again, a 7-0 run this time to take a 19-14 lead at the end of the first quarter.

Both teams found more offense in the second quarter with the Trojans quickly extending the lead to 25-19. North Texas fired back, tying the game whenever the Trojans tried to push the tempo.

The Mean Green found rhythm late in the quarter, nabbing a 40-37 lead until a Peguero jumper brought it down to a 40-39 game. Neither team would get a basket from there, the Trojans trailed 40-39 at the half.

Troy came out of the break hot, going on a 14-4 run to push the lead to as high as nine, 53-44. The Trojan hot hand wouldn’t deter North Texas as the Mean Green gradually cut into the lead, getting it down to 62-59. A Dyer layup would be the response to give Troy a five-point lead into the fourth quarter.

In a quarter that felt like a heavyweight fight, North Texas threw the first punch, eliminating the Trojan lead to tie the game at 67. Troy would hold the Mean Green back for a majority of the quarter before two made free throws put the Trojans in a one-point hole with 1:21 left.

The teams went back and forth on free throws the rest of the way as a Jackson free throw tied the game at 74 before a North Texas free throw gave them a 75-74 lead with 16 seconds left. Jenkins would find a rebound and foul with only two seconds on the clock to go to the stripe, splitting the two free throws to send the game to overtime tied at 75.

North Texas found the energy first in overtime with a good 3-pointer off the tip. Troy would stay on the backfoot, going down as much as six, 86-80, with two minutes left. With 1:52 left on the clock, Peguero decided she wasn’t done with college basketball yet.

The senior drained a corner three to cut the deficit to three before hitting a circus and-1 with 23 seconds left to tie the game.

From there the Trojans needed defense and they got it, as a missed Mean Green jumper saw Baez grab the rebound before getting fouled with next to nothing left on the clock. With 0.2 seconds left, Baez only needed to make one to all but secure the Trojan win. Instead the senior calmly sank both as Troy advanced to the WNIT Great 8 for the second year in a row.

The Great 8 game tried its best to match the energy from the Super16 game as the Trojans once again secured an overtime win, this time on the road in Fargo, North Dakota. The Bison were the second team Troy faced in both the regular season and post season, after Chattanooga, with the Trojans improving to a combined 4-0 against them.

Troy once again saw balanced efforts with five separate Trojans scoring in double figures for the third game in a row, all post season wins. Senior Peguero led the way after her heroics against North Texas, as she put up a career-high 22 points.

Behind Peguero came fellow senior guard Wagner, who added 18 points to the final tally.

The forwards also feasted as Dyer and Jackson both finished with 14 points while Fortuna Ngnawo added 11 points. Jackson and Ngnawo both finished with double-doubles too with Jackson grabbing 14 boards and Ngnawo nabbing 13.

The Bison leaned into their home court advantage early, building up a quick 13-6 lead. Troy couldn’t find much of an opening to cut into a seven-point lead until a Leilani Guion jumper got the momentum going.

The Guion bucket was quickly followed by a Ngnawo basket and Wagner layup to move the lead from 19-12 in favor of the Bison to 19-18. North Dakota State found one more layup before Ngnawo free throws put Troy down one, 21-20, heading into the second quarter.

A Jackson layup 10 seconds into the second quarter gave Troy their first lead of the night, but only for a short while. The Bison fired back immediately to regain their lead before the Trojans dropped a quick five points in the bucket to lead 27-23.

The rest of the quarter saw a battle between the two teams, one the Trojans would eventually win to take a 46-41 lead into the half.

North Dakota State cut into the lead straight out of halftime but couldn’t find a way past until the 4:20 mark in the quarter, taking a 55-54 lead. Two Bison layups saw the Trojans fall into a three-point hole until a Jenkins jumper gave Troy 56 to the Bisons 57.

The teams went back and forth the rest of the four minutes, with the Bison holding a 62-61 lead on the Trojans heading into the fourth.

Troy went off to the races out of the break, laying down a 10-1 run. The run combined with the Trojans keeping a solid lead until the last 51 seconds would have broken many teams down, the Bisons were not one of those teams.

The Bisons made two free throws to cut the lead down to 78-75 before getting fouled on a three-point attempt. The ensuing free throws saw Troy’s lead dwindle down to one point, now only up 79-78.

The Trojans would make two of their own free throws before a North Dakota State three with 14 seconds left tied the game at 81. Troy saw two good looks in the final seconds but couldn’t capitalize on either as the game went to overtime.

Troy found some gas in the tank through overtime as the Trojans started the extra quarter with a 10-3 run, going up 91-84 on the Bison. From there the Trojans just needed to hit free throws, and hit free throws they did, as Troy went 6-for-8 from the charity stripe in the final minute to clinch the win.

The Trojans continue their road trip with a bus ride to Normal, Illinois, to take on Illinois State. The game is set for a 6:30 p.m. tip-off on Wednesday, Apr. 2 while being streamed on ESPN+.