FRISCO, Texas— A’riel Jackson set a season-high for the second straight game, and the Auburn women’s basketball team remained unbeaten on the season with a 58-50 win over California Wednesday night in the Hoopfest Challenge.
“We talked about it at the beginning of the year, you write down your goals,” Auburn head coach Larry Vickers said. “And we were like, we know we want to be a postseason team. When you say you want to be a postseason team, you’ve got to beat good teams like this. We came down here to Texas. UTSA is a tournament team (from last year). Cal was a tournament team. And that’s the kind of wins, even though it’s early for us, that we just want to keep trying to get.”
The Tigers (8-0) never trailed after halftime as defense proved to be the difference once again, holding their third straight opponent to 50 points or less.
“I didn’t feel like we could pressure that group,” Vickers said. “So we pressed a lot less than we generally do. And we still found a way in the half-court to make rotations. And we wanted to control the tempo. We wanted to make sure we controlled the basketball game, and I felt like we did that today.”
Jackson finished with 17 points to lead the Auburn offense, going 7-of-11 from the field and knocking down all three of her 3-point attempts on the night.
“Coach LV says he never wants to see the end of the play,” Jackson said. “Whenever I’m feeling it and I’m open, I go over the screen and nobody’s there, I’ll shoot. It was there.
“Definitely a team effort. When I couldn’t go, my teammates had my back. And they were hitting shots when we needed them. People came off the bench and were hitting big shots.”
Kaitlyn Duhon had a career-high seven steals, the most by an Auburn player this season, to go along with three rebounds and two assists. Khady Leye added 10 points and a team-leading five rebounds and three assists.
Auburn shot 45.8 percent from the field and held Cal to a season-low 34 percent. The Tigers capitalized on their few 3-point attempts, hitting 4-of-8, while Cal attempted 28 treys, hitting eight.
The lead changed hands several times in the early minutes, but the Tigers took a one-point lead after 10 minutes, 14-13.
With Cal leading 19-18 midway through the second quarter, junior Clara Koulibaly made her second straight shot to put the Tigers back in front. That would spark a 10-2 run over the next four-plus minutes, capped by back-to-back Jackson buckets, to put the Tigers ahead 28-21. Auburn would never trail again.
But Cal didn’t go away. After Auburn pushed its lead to 32-24 just two minutes into the second half, the Bears went on an 8-0 run to tie it at 34-all with less than five minutes to play. Cal, however, would make just one more field goal the rest of the quarter, and the Tigers would take a 43-40 lead to the fourth.
Ja’Mia Harris would draw contact on a drive to the basket and make the free throw to push the lead to 48-42 at the 8:04 mark. After several empty possessions both ways, Leye broke through with a big bucket at the 5:52 mark to put the Tigers ahead by eight, 50-42.
Once again, Cal would rally, moving within one possession in the last two minutes. Harissoum Coulibaly came through with back-to-back buckets to put Auburn ahead 55-50, and late free throws by Harris and Duhon sealed the victory.
The win avenged a pair of losses to this Cal team the last two seasons, one at home in 2023 and on the road in Berkeley last season.
Lulu Twidale led Cal with 18 points, hitting four treys on the night.
Auburn returns to The Plains this Sunday for a showdown of unbeatens as they take on the Oregon Ducks at Neville Arena. Game time is 2 p.m. CT, and tickets are available at AUBTix.com.