BYU women’s basketball fighting to stay positive through difficult season
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- BYU coach Amber Whiting talks to her team in a timeout during a Big 12 women’s basketball game against Texas Tech at the Marriott Center on January 20, 2024.
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- BYU senior Kemery Congdon goes up for a layup during the Big 12 game against Colorado at the Marriott Center in Provo on Wednesday, Jan. 29, 2025.
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- BYU’s Delaney Gibb (11) drives against Utah’s Ines Vieira in a Big 12 women’s basketball game at the Marriott Center on Saturday, Jan. 25, 2025.
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- BYU women’s basketball coach Amber Whiting yells instructions to her team against Colorado State in a women’s college basketball game at the Marriott Center on Wednesday, Nov. 13, 2024.
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- BYU freshman Delaney Gibb goes up for a layup during the Big 12 game against Colorado at the Marriott Center in Provo on Wednesday, Jan. 29, 2025.
Colorado head coach JR Payne talked after Wednesday’s Big 12 game against BYU at the Marriott Center about the ups and downs of being a coach during a close game.
“Sometimes you see them really play well and others you are like, ‘what are we doing?'” Payne said.
Cougar head coach Amber Whiting can certainly relate.
Her BYU squad has been on a roller-coaster ride during the 2024-25 season, but unfortunately for the Cougars there have been more downs than ups in conference play.
Wednesday’s game was just the latest example as Payne’s Buffaloes held on to get the road win while BYU fell to 1-8 in league action.
“I saw a lot of improvement tonight in a lot of things and we were short-handed,” Whiting said. “These times are where you are going to see who’s on the boat with you, and I love the fight of those girls out there. They gave everything they had, so I was super-proud of them.”
She talked about how she saw huge improvement in how her team got after the boards after having a tough time securing rebounds in a hard loss to Utah on Jan. 25.
“We just really stressed it in practice,” Whiting said. “We gave up 18 offensive rebound last game, and that was unacceptable. We had a good, long chat about it and showed film. Sometimes I felt like the girls cared more about the offensive side and so they were just trying to go before we actually secured the ball. Tonight we did a much better job.”
But although that was a step in the right direction, the Cougars struggled in another key area for them: 3-point shooting.
“We had a lot of wide open threes, and you could just feel the momentum,” Whiting said. “You could feel that if they knock some down, the place is going to erupt. We had a lot of them but it just wasn’t our night. We shot 27% and that’s not what we normally shoot.”
While not having everything clicking has been a frustrating trend for BYU, Whiting said she always knows what she is going to get in the effort department.
“I just can’t say enough good things about this group, the fact that they play with so much like passion and just grit and toughness,” Whiting said. “They hold each other accountable out there and they’re going to give you everything that they have. That’s the one thing I always can count on. It’s never wavered any game that we’ve been in, and I just love that about them.”
The way the Cougars don’t fold under pressure has kept them in a number of games, but BYU hasn’t been able to finish. Against Colorado, for example, the home team had four different opportunities to take the lead in the final minute but couldn’t get anything to go in the 1-point loss.
“Finishing is about experience, right?” Whiting said. “We had two freshmen out there finishing and a sophomore. Those are young kids and so they’re getting all this experience just being in games like that. One of these times it is going to work.”
She added that the ideal would be to not have it come down to the final plays, to take care of business during the rest of the game to not need those final plays.
Whiting knows that it can be tough to stay positive when enduring a tough losing streak but said she and her staff keep that in mind.
“I’ve got to build them up,” Whiting said. “Tomorrow I’m gonna build them up again. We will have film where we get down and dirty with the reality of what happened and why we lost, but then we turn around and we always focus on the positive. The fact that they bounce back every single game just shows their character and who they are as individuals. I don’t doubt that they’re gonna turn around and show up at Arizona State on Saturday.”
BYU’s next chance to get back on track will take place when the Cougars play the Sun Devils in Tempe on Saturday. Tipoff is scheduled for 6:30 p.m. MST and the game can be seen on ESPN+.
