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Laura Beeman was pleased with her team’s haul of Big West postseason awards announced Monday, but not completely satisfied.
Smooth-shooting guard Julissa Tago was named an All-Big West first-teamer as the most notable of four Rainbow Wahine players bestowed honors. She achieved a huge jump in production — 5.3 points per game as a junior to 15.0 as a senior — by overhauling her conditioning going into her final season and last week became a member of the program’s 1,000-point club on senior night.
But it was another first-time first-teamer, guard Raina Perez of Cal State Fullerton, who was named Big West Player of the Year after making a huge leap of her own, to 20.3 points per game — 12th nationally.
“It’s bittersweet for me. I think she’s Player of the Year, personally,” Beeman said of Tago. “Maybe I can’t be objective, but I think J is absolutely Player of the Year. Nothing against Raina Perez. She’s an amazing young lady. She does a lot for Cal State Fullerton.
“But as far as the conference selection, I think it’s great. J’s put the work in. For her to be recognized by my colleagues … it’s amazing for her. She’s put the work in this year. So for her to get that first team, we will take it.”
Tago, a 5-foot-9 native of Medford, Ore., set the program 3-point record for a season (66 and counting) and is No. 3 for a career with 140. By sinking a game-record eight triples at UC Irvine on Feb. 27, she erupted for 34 points, tying for the fifth-highest total by any Wahine.
Tago was named to the BWC All-Freshman team in 2017, starting all but two games that year, but went without further league recognition until this year’s two in-season Big West Player of the Week nods. She emerged to become UH’s first first-teamer since Sarah Toeaina in 2017-18.
“Being on any team is an honor,” she said before boarding the team bus behind the Stan Sheriff Center. “It’s somewhere I felt like I could’ve been ever since my freshman year. So it’s nice just being here and getting this award … but I just want a championship.”
UH, the fourth seed in this week’s Big West tournament at Long Beach State’s Walter Pyramid and Anaheim’s Honda Center, also received the Best Sixth Player award and an All-BWC honorable mention in Amy Atwell, an all-freshman team nod for point guard Nae Nae Calhoun and an all-defensive team berth for junior wing Jadynn Alexander.
Atwell, a 6-foot junior forward from Perth, Australia, scored 10.7 points per game and led all BWC players in 3-point percentage at .449. It was the fifth time UH took the award for top bench player in eight seasons since rejoining the league in women’s basketball in 2012-13.
“The great news about that, it shows how we share the ball,” Beeman said. “We are definitely not the sum of one person, but all the parts. For Amy to get that award, I’m really proud of her. She’s kind of assumed that role … when everyone knows she could be a starter.”
Calhoun, a Riverside, Calif., native, averaged 5.4 points, 3.7 assists and 1.5 steals per game as the team’s primary ball-handler. The 5-foot-10 Alexander, of Monroe, Wash., usually drew the assignment on opponents’ best offensive players and supplied 6.2 points herself.
The Wahine (15-14, 9-7 Big West) will play a team to be determined in the second round at the Pyramid on Wednesday — the Beach themselves, if the fifth-seeded hosts of the first two rounds get past eighth-seeded Cal Poly today.
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