After completing their first winning season since 2010-11, a few players from the Arizona Women’s Basketball team are bringing back some hardware!
2018-19 was a season of progress for the Arizona Women’s Basketball team. After finishing a rough, 6-24 (2-16), the Cats turned things around significantly.
As the Wildcats finished the year 17-12 (7-11) with the Pac-12 Tournament still to play, the improved play of course came from a collective team effort. However, there’s no doubt the improved play of the Cats came largely from Aari McDonald and Cate Reese.
Arizona Wildcats
McDonald, the redshirt sophomore originally from the University of Washington that came to Arizona two years ago, finally was able to make her presence felt! In her debut season with Arizona, the crafty and prolific guard finished the 2018-19 season averaging 24.9 points per game.
Her play was so worldly for the Cats, that without surprise, she was named to the All Pac-12 team, as well as the All Pac-12 Defensive team on Tuesday afternoon.
However, what shouldn’t be lost in the stellar play and accolades of McDonald, is true freshman and former McDonald’s All-American, Cate Reese!
Coming in with plenty of hype, it’s hard to match and perform to the high level expected from you. For Reese, she seemed to have no problems adjusting accordingly.
As the Wildcats paced themselves to their best Pac-12 finish since 2010-11, Reese was also a big part of that success, as the true freshman averaged 11.1 points and 6.8 rebounds per game.
Because of her stellar play, Reese was named to the All-Freshman team.
😤😤😤 pic.twitter.com/LpWPOaitfu
— Arizona Basketball (@ArizonaWBB) March 6, 2019
The great thing about this duo is that they’re young, and will be a big part of Arizona’s success as the head into the Pac-12 Tournament and beyond!
At 17-12, the Wildcats still potentially have a chance to make the NCAA Tournament if they win out, otherwise, NIT is very possible, which would be a huge accomplishment from finishing 6-24 the year before.
Arizona enters the tournament as the No. 8 seed, and will begin play on Thursday, when they take on USC at MGM Grand in Las Vegas!
At Zona Zealots, we’re proud of our Cats getting the recognition they deserve and hope they can continue their stellar play into the postseason! Bear Down, Arizona!