BYU defeated Stanford 76-61 at the Marriott Center on Mar. 26, advancing to the Women’s Basketball Invitation Tournament (WBIT) Final Four.
The win is significant for BYU as it marks their 25th victory of the season and their first appearance in a WBIT Final Four since advancing to the regional final of the 2010 Women’s National Invitation Tournament. The Cougars have now achieved three postseason wins in a single season for the first time since that year.
Delaney Gibb led all scorers with 27 points, including four three-pointers, seven rebounds, and four assists. Brinley Cannon contributed 15 points on six-of-ten shooting, while Olivia Hamlin added twelve points along with defensive plays during BYU’s decisive fourth-quarter run. Lara Rohkohl recorded a double-double with ten points and eleven rebounds, and Kambree Barber contributed six points and ten boards.
Head coach Lee Cummard said after the game: “Fantastic college basketball game. Two high-level teams competing out there. But I think the buy-in, the urgency and just the sense to compete in front of a great crowd was the difference in the game. It got close there, and Delaney [Gibb] kind of had a stretch where she just said, ‘I’m the best player on the court, and I’m going to show everybody.’”
The Cougars controlled rebounding throughout—outrebounding Stanford by seventeen—and used a dominant defensive effort late in the game to secure victory after leading by only one point entering the fourth quarter. With this win, Cummard becomes BYU’s winningest first-year head coach with twenty-five victories.
BYU will next play Kansas Jayhawks in Wichita for a spot in the WBIT championship game.
