photo by: Sarah Buchanan/Special to the Journal-World

Kansas sophomore guard S'Mya Nichols shoots a free throw against Arizona on Sunday, Jan. 19, 2025, in Lawrence.

The Kansas women’s basketball team (12-6) provided a bounce-back game for conference newcomer Arizona (12-8), which ended its three-game losing streak as the Jayhawks dropped the second game of their homestand 74-59 on Sunday afternoon.

The defeat came as a result of a sputtering offense in the first half and an inconsistent defense throughout the entire game, as KU got beaten in the paint and from deep to lose its fifth game of the year by double digits.

“Coach keeps us very prepared for things like that,” KU guard Sania Copeland said of Arizona’s dual-threat offense. “It was just on us tonight, honestly. We just didn’t come with how we prepared for them.”

“They came in here and I think they had a good game plan, so obviously credit to them,” teammate Elle Evans said. “I think they did a lot of things well and we didn’t… so that’s why we got this outcome.”

For Arizona, Kansas City, Missouri, native Jada Williams continued a successful sophomore campaign after being named to the Pac-12 all-freshman team last year with 13 points, four rebounds and five assists while Lauryn Swann entered off the bench with a team-high 17 points as five Wildcats finished with double-digit points.

“I don’t know that anybody for us played as well defensively as we needed to to be successful, and I think that was more of a team thing than an individual thing,” head coach Brandon Schneider said postgame. “This was one of the few games, even though we haven’t been great defensively, I didn’t think that our execution of the plan and the scout was near as good as it has to be to win games.”

Sophomore guard S’Mya Nichols led KU with 21 points on the day.

The Jayhawks got beaten inside frequently early on, losing the rebound battle by four and giving up eight of Arizona’s 19 points in the paint. They also turned the ball over five times, allowing five points off these mistakes, while scoring no points off of the Wildcats’ four turnovers.

After spending the first five minutes of the game dominating down low, Arizona switched things up in the last five minutes of the first period, going 3-for-5 from downtown to open up a 19-11 lead heading into the second.

Kansas continued to struggle on offense, missing a couple of open looks and making unnecessary passes. The Jayhawks faltered in their usually successful three-point game, as Elle Evans hit their first triple of the game over 17 minutes in. Meanwhile, the Wildcats shot 40% from the field to drop another 18 points, five of those coming off Kansas turnovers, but the Jayhawks kept things a bit closer in the second thanks to improved rebounding, largely due to Arizona’s attempts to attack from deep. But whenever Kansas mounted any multi-possession runs, the Wildcats answered back immediately, keeping the Jayhawks in a consistent 10-plus-point deficit as they entered halftime down 37-23.

At the break, guard Laia Conesa was Kansas’ leading scorer with eight points, while Nichols added on seven of her own in an uncharacteristically slow game on her part. The Jayhawks also posted no bench points in the first 20 minutes, with Nichols, Conesa, Evans and Copeland combining for all 23 points on their own.

“We’ve got a lot of experience on our bench, you know, top to bottom, and I think it’s just every time out and at halftime, you know, our adjustments at halftime were more related to offense,” Schneider said. “And then just, could we actually do what we planned on doing to start this game on the defensive end?”

After a wary approach to the first half, Nichols found her way offensively in the second by driving in and drawing contact as she so often does, dropping eight points early while going 5-for-6 from the free-throw line. Regan Williams added on six points of her own after going scoreless in the first half, looking much more confident in her position down low and fitting into Schneider’s set plays a lot better as a cutter and on set pick-and-rolls.

“I mean, obviously I think S’Mya does a lot for us,” Evans said. “So maybe when she’s not 100%, I think that’s big for other people on our team to step up and try and fill in where we need to be, (but) we weren’t as aggressive as we probably could have been.”.

But while Kansas’ offense improved in the second half and its rebounding numbers stayed solid, Arizona kept the Jayhawks down double digits for the entire second half.

The fourth quarter was Kansas’ best yet from a scoring perspective, as the Jayhawks rallied 18 points and shot 53%, but Arizona easily matched that total, attacking the paint once again as Williams picked up her fourth foul of the game.

Twelve of Arizona’s 21 points in the fourth came from its bench, highlighting a disparity that sank the Jayhawks. In all, the Wildcats collected 32 bench points in the game, including a career-high 11 points from freshman forward Montaya Dew, while Kansas got two points off its bench from a layup by Nadira Eltayeb on the last play of the game. Eltayeb missed the free throw for the chance at a three-point play, ending Kansas’ night with a 73% free-throw percentage in the 74-59 loss.

After the messy loss, both Schneider and the duo of Evans and Copeland mentioned that their issues came from failing to implement what they had prepared to do against a tricky Arizona team coming off a tough stretch. Copeland said the Jayhawks would come out “much more prepared” in the next game, while Schneider said the rest of his day would consist of watching Utah tape as Kansas goes on the road to face the 23rd-ranked Utes on Wednesday at 8 p.m. Central.

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