Bulls crush Sacred Heart 76-55 as Oursler dominates in the post with career high 18 points

After a giant win over Duquesne, Buffalo Bulls Women’s Basketball came back to Alumni with a favorable matchup with the Sacred Heart Pioneers. Although the Pioneers were chosen to win their conference in the preseason, UB exposed how awful the Northeast Conference is. With a crushing performance from Cassie Oursler in the post, Buffalo would take this win 76-55.

The only real fight that we saw from Sacred Heart came in the first three or so minutes. Buffalo was keeping pace with the Pioneers but soon enough UB’s power trio took over. Reminiscent of last season, JoAnna Smith, Cassie Oursler, and Stephanie Reid took their opponent by a storm. The trio finished the quarter with 8, 8, and 4 points respectively, giving the Bulls a large 26-10 lead to work with for the rest of the game.

Coach Jack opened up the rest of the game to the bench in the second quarter as UB saw a lot of time from players like Courtney Wilkins, Ayoleka Sodade, and Liisa Ups. Although the offensive chemistry lacked in this quarter, the Bulls were still able to find ways to score and kept playing aggressive defense. UB did a phenomenal job taking care of the ball as well as they only gave up 5 turnovers.

With a 47-23 halftime lead, Buffalo only needed to put the game on cruise control to get the victory. Despite success the Bulls continued to see in these final quarters, the Bulls could’ve done a better job at rebounding the ball. Often times UB wouldn’t actually jump for the rebound and lose a sure board to a Sacred Heart player. Regardless, Buffalo easily found their way to a 76-55 win.

The Bulls were lead by another big performance by Cassie Oursler. Her 18 points is a new career high and she also landed 8 rebounds to cap the effort off. Oursler is finding her groove early in the season and will be a threat come MAC play. Smith and Reid’s 11 and 10 points respectively would summarize a game dominated by the Power Trio.

With the win, Buffalo continues to be undefeated, but more importantly they look even better than their 6-0 start from a year prior. At 5-0, Buffalo still has two more reasonable tests in Hofstra and Fordham, but could go undefeated in non-conference play. Also, Buffalo clocks in at #3 in national RPI, third to only WBB powerhouses UConn and Notre Dame.

The Bulls are back in action at Alumni Arena this Thursday at 7:00PM. They’ll take on Danny White’s new home of Central Florida and the game will be broadcasted on ESPN3.

More about this game will be said later.