The landmark achievements just keep coming for head coach Ryun Williams and the CSU women’s basketball team. After breaking the school record for consecutive wins earlier this season, the Rams on Tuesday became the first team in Mountain West history to win three consecutive outright conference titles. Now they have their sights set on a perfect record in conference play.
A 68-55 come-from-behind win over second-place Fresno State secured the Mountain West and set the stage for a possible 18-0 season in the conference.
“This is awesome, we want to go undefeated in conference,” senior guard Jamie Patrick said postgame. “We’ve got one more game, then we’ll go to the tournament. This night was pretty much magical because we played so well toward the end.”
The No. 22/23 Rams will take a 24-game win streak, the second-longest in the country, on the road against Air Force on Friday with a chance to also become only the second team in school history to reach the 27-win plateau. This team is chasing the 1998-99 team, which finished a school-best 33-3 and reached the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Tournament.
Colorado State trailed at halftime against the Bulldogs, but a huge second-half effort from Patrick on Senior Night propelled them to victory. The senior guard scored 19 of her game-high 21 points in the second half while junior Ellen Nystrom flirted with a rare triple-double with 16 points, nine rebounds, nine assists and four steals.
With just one game remaining on the regular season schedule, Williams knows his team will have a target on its back in their finale and heading into the postseason. He said postgame, how proud he is of his team’s because of that fact.
“The focus has been tremendous. It has to be tremendous because it was Fresno State’s turn to try to beat us. Nobody wants us to go undefeated. New Mexico wanted to be the team to beat us, Nevada wanted to be the team to beat us, and so we know what we’re getting into every night. It’s not easy, but it’s how we handle it and I’m impressed with their toughness and resiliency. We have a lot of work ahead of us obviously. Our goal is still in front of us and that should keep driving us.”
That goal is now a double conference championship – regular season and tournament – and a deep run in the NCAA Tournament.
The ’98-99 Rams (who were runners-up the ’99 WAC Tournament) are still at the top of the mountain in terms of total wins and NCAA Tournament success, but Williams has his team inching ever closer to knocking them off their perch.
