Canada Basketball – MEXICO CITY, MEXICO (August 2, 2018) – Team Canada defeated El Salvador 81-52 to advance to 2-0 at the FIBA U18 Women’s Americas Championship 2018.

Click here for the full team roster.

Niyah Becker gave everything for the red and white in Canada’s win, shooting 85% which led her to a team high 15 points, all while grabbing 9 rebounds, 2 assists, 2 steals and a block.

Canada’s 42% shooting during the first half of the first quarter jumped them out to a 17-7 lead that held until the end of the first where they were ahead of El Salvador 23-9.

The lead grew for the red and white in the second quarter as they out-scored El Salvador 23-11 and went into the half-time break leading 46-20.

Canada held strong in the third quarter to slightly extend their lead and go into the final 10 minutes ahead 65-33.  Finishing the game strong, Canada held off the remaining push from El Salvador and took the victory.

Click here for the full box score.

QUOTES

“I thought our pressure was good in the first half, we gave them some issues, it set the tempo, it allowed us to get some easy looks offensively.  I thought in the second half when we went to zone it was a good learning opportunity for us in terms of how we need to better play zone and being prepared to play it but hats off to El Salvador, they hit some big shots in the fourth quarter but all in all it was a good win for us and we’ll take the lessons and move forward and be ready for Mexico tomorrow” – Claire Meadows

“I think we had a good start in the game, we had good O-boards and we had good looks finding people and we just have to continue it throughout the tournament so we can be successful” – Niyah Becker

UP NEXT

With the win, Canada moves on to play Mexico in their final game of group play on August 3 at 9:30 PM EST.  

To stay updated on the U18 Women’s Americas Championship 2018, follow Canada Basketball on Twitter.