Talk about persevering.
The Gonzaga women’s basketball team couldn’t find any footing early Sunday morning, committing 11 turnovers in the first half, seven coming in the second quarter.
The Zags righted themselves early in the third quarter and caught fire in the final 4 minutes to hold off the Marquette Golden Eagles 65-61 in the Coconut Hoops Classic at Florida Gulf Coast University.
“It was a second game in a row when we saw some of our leaders play steady even during the times that they weren’t scoring a bunch of points or getting a ton of rebounds,” Gonzaga coach Lisa Fortier said.
Marquette took its final lead at 56-54. Then Gonzaga sophomore guard Allie Turner, who had had an off shooting effort to that point, hit back-to-back 3-pointers to go along with a steal and breakaway layup from Teryn Gardner. All of a sudden the Zags led 62-56 with 2:54 to go.
The Golden Eagles pulled within 63-61 with 50 seconds remaining, but two free throws from Turner with three seconds to go sealed the win.
“Really happy for our team,” Fortier said. “On the whole weekend we grew and improved. We played two good teams and we could have won both of them.”
Gonzaga evened its overall record at 4-4.
The 11 turnovers in the first half by Gonzaga matched what it had in four quarters against Indiana on Friday. The Zags finished with 19 against Marquette.
Turner made just 4 of her first 14 shots, but snapped out of the funk with the late 3-pointers.
“They were keyed on her … playing her physically,” Fortier said. “She stayed ready. You have to be ready to shoot it when the opportunity comes up.”
Marquette (4-3) started the game hot, making its first six shots. The Golden Eagles made 11 of 15 in the first quarter, taking a 26-22 lead into the second.
The Golden Eagles’ biggest lead was 38-30 going into halftime.
Gonzaga fought back to start the third quarter.
“The third quarter was really important for us,” Fortier said. “We came out with really good energy out of halftime defensively, limiting them to single digit points (eight).”
Lauren Whittaker had her second double-double, leading Gonzaga with 23 points including 3 of 6 3-pointers and 13 rebounds. She was named to the All-Tournament team. Turner had 17 points, four assists and four rebounds. Gardner added 10 points and five rebounds off the bench.
The Zags dominated the boards 47-27.
“Our goal is to keep getting better every game and today we were better,” Fortier said. “We did a great job down the stretch of executing – kind of working through some mistakes that we made on the defensive side.”
Skylar Forbes led Marquette with 24 points.
Gonzaga returns home for three games, beginning Thursday against Grand Canyon, followed by UC Davis on Saturday and Arizona State on Dec. 16.