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One big question for the Wildcats heading into the first postseason game was how they would respond to playing without their sophomore playmaker Jada Williams.

Williams sat out of the game with a nagging foot injury that had been bothering her all season long.

The last time Arizona played NAU — back in November, six games into the season — Williams didn’t play in that one, either. She was out with a concussion after banging her head into Paulina Paris’ nose during practice.

Arizona women's basketball shoots around ahead of their first-round game vs. NAU in the 2025 WBIT Thursday, March 20. The McKale Center court has been transformed for the tournament. 

That loss, to the Lumberjacks in Flagstaff, was one that Arizona never forgot.

Thursday night had a fast and furious finish. However, in the end, Arizona couldn’t score in the waning seconds, as NAU edged UA 71-69 Thursday at McKale Center in the first round of the WBIT.

Wildcats guard Skylar Jones (4) dribbles by Lumberjacks guard Taylor Feldman into another line of NAU defense during the first half of the first-round WBIT game at McKale Center, March 20, 2025.

Arizona finishes the 2024-25 season 19-14.

NAU (27-6) faces Belmont on Sunday in the second round of the WBIT. Belmont beat Middle Tennessee State, 64-51.

“Going into this WBIT, I did not think we were going to win the WBIT,” Arizona coach Adia Barnes said. “I felt very different going into the WNIT in 2019. We wanted to win it. We wanted to play. We did not want to play here. We were discouraged from not being in the NCAA Tournament ... I’m not saying everybody didn’t (want to play), but overall, as a collective, we didn’t want to win. We didn’t. We were indifferent. I’m not surprised at the result, to be honest.”

Arizona was also without Jorynn Ross, who is out with a sore knee and Montaya Dew, who had surgery on Friday to repair her meniscus. All three — Williams, Dew and Ross — were on the bench cheering on their teammates.

Lumberjacks guard Nyah Moran (2) keeps high pressure on Wildcats guard Paulina Paris (23) during the first half of the WBIT game at McKale Center, March 20, 2025.

NAU’s Nyah Moran made a jumper with a little more than a minute left in the game, to give the Lumberjacks a 71-69 lead. The Wildcats couldn’t score, and with less than 10 seconds left, Arizona got a defensive stop but couldn’t get a shot off before the buzzer.

“It was going to be a quick shot for a double stagger for Isis (Beh),” Barnes said of the last play. “We knew Isis would be open for a right-handed layup or, if not, the guards on top of the open. I think Sky (Jones) was open and she’s a really good 3-point shooter, but I think those are hard situations to recognize.

“My philosophy as a coach is that it never comes down to the last play. If you look at it, it’s never the last play that defines winning and losing, because we would have made a shot, and it’s a very hard shot. I think it comes down to the toughness and the lack of communication. From the beginning of the game, it comes down to the 13 offensive rebounds, and first half. It comes down to lack of sprinting back on transition defense. It comes down to those little things that they accumulate, and then you dig yourself a hole and it makes it really hard to win. I think they out-played us and they wanted it more. I don’t think we wanted to play and I don’t think we wanted it.”

The Wildcats were outrebounded 52-41 and gave up 20 second-chance points.

Jones scored 21 points, with 14 coming in the first half. Breya Cunningham chipped in 19 and Lauryn Swann had 13.

Cunningham pulled down 11 rebounds, had five blocks and one steal. Jones added nine rebounds.

Wildcats forward Breya Cunningham (25) earns two points for Arizona during the WBIT game against NAU at McKale Center, March 20, 2025.

Beh, in her last game as a Wildcat, had six assists four steals, one block and six points.

The Wildcats knew the Lumberjacks wouldn’t quietly go away. After Arizona took a 5-point lead, 36-31 into halftime, NAU climbed back into it — and even held small leads — in the second half. It all came down to the final 10 minutes of the back-and-forth battle. NAU went up 69-64 but the Wildcats scored five straight points to tie the game.

Arizona came out from the tip and was sharing the ball and everyone was getting in on the action. As time wore on in the first quarter, Jones started getting more aggressive on the offensive end. Jones scored nine points (4 of 6), leading the Wildcats to a 22-18 lead after 10 minutes.

In the second quarter, however, the script flipped as UA got stagnant and wasn’t moving without the ball. The Wildcats went on a scoring drought, taking bad shots at the end of the shot clock, throwing the ball away and turning the ball over.

NAU took a one-point lead on a jumper by Taylor Feldman, but Cunningham responded on a put back to give UA the slim 31-30 lead.

UA went on to score five of the next six points to take the lead into halftime.

NAU’s Sophie Glancey and Feldman combined to score 45 points. Glancey pulled down 14 rebounds. Moran scored 10 — including the game-winner — and picked three steals.

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Contact sports reporter PJ Brown at pjbrown@tucson.com. On X(Twitter): @PJBrown09