By Jeff Faraudo
West Coast Conference Columnist
There is a marvelous tangle in the upper half of the West Coast Conference women’s basketball standings with five teams separated by one game at the top. LMU and Gonzaga have the most momentum heading into Thursday’s slate, with each program on a three-game winning streak. The Lions are 5-2 and tied with Portland for fourth place, just one game back of co-leaders Gonzaga and Oregon State, both 6-1, and a half-game behind Santa Clara at 6-2.
There are layers to LMU’s conference ledger that provide a snapshot of how competitive the team has been. The Lions posted home victories over Santa Clara and Oregon State, the latter who was picked by the coaches in the preseason to win the regular season title. They have three road victories. They have won four of their past five. And the Lions’ defeats came in overtime vs. San Francisco and double-overtime at Gonzaga.
All this from an LMU team picked by the league’s coaches to finish ninth this season, which also is where they wound up a year ago. “We know our preseason ranking,” graduate transfer guard Jess Lawson said. “We didn’t believe in that.”
Fifth-year head coach Aarika Hughes has her team at 11-7 overall and pursuing the program’s first winning season since 2018-19. The next step is Thursday’s home game vs. Portland (11-8, 5-2), the reigning regular-season co-champ, also on the move with four victories in its past five outings.
“Really proud of the steps we’re taking and the growth we’re seeing. It’s been a long time coming,” Hughes said. “You want them to enjoy the moment but never be satisfied. We still have so many games left to play. It’s not lost on me that this is the first time since I’ve been here that we’ve had this type of success. The job is far from done.”
The success LMU is enjoying right now has its roots in the final weeks of the 2024-25 season. The Lions won four in a row, including their conference tournament opener, before losing to San Francisco in a second-round game.
Forward Maya Hernandez, now a junior, helped spark that late-season surge, averaging 16 points over the final five games. After posting 2024-25 season numbers of 12.8 points and 7.8 rebounds — with a 33-point performance at South Dakota that triggered a comeback victory from 21 points down — Hernandez has given the Lions steady production this year.
Motivated by that strong finish, Hernandez is averaging 14.6 points, 5.6 rebounds and accounts for 15 of the Lions’ 24 blocked shots. She has scored in double digits 15 times in 18 games.
“Maya’s hungry and she also knows what it’s like to be there and feel the momentum that you build and you earn,” Hughes said. “Seeing that and tasting that last year, she’s definitely taken a lot of responsibility this year. Maya’s the anchor for us.”
Hernandez came to LMU from a powerhouse Archbishop Mitty High School program in San Jose, Calif. She was accustomed to winning and has enjoyed rediscovering that side of things.
“It feels really satisfying,” she said. “We’ve gone through a lot of ups and downs. We’ve done a really good job of learning from it all. It makes every win now feel so much better, so much more rewarding, knowing how hard we’ve worked for it. Seeing it come to fruition has been really nice.”
Hernandez said fellow returnees, including Carly Heidger, Mari Somvichian, Paula Reus Piza and Allison Clarke, have contributed to the team’s culture and improvement. One newcomer has made a sizable impact, even at 5-foot-7.
Lawson, a Las Vegas native, played the past two seasons at Central Michigan, where she thrived on the court but barely tolerated the Midwest weather. During a phone conversation this week, she checked the temperature in Mount Pleasant, Michigan: 11 degrees. At the same time, it was 66 in Los Angeles. “I love it out here,” Lawson said.
The Lions are thrilled to have her. Lawson is averaging a team-leading 15.1 points per game, but her superhero skill is rebounding, where she ranks third in the West Coast Conference at 8.1 per game. That has her trailing only 6-foot-3 Lauren Whittaker of Gonzaga and 6-1 Shorna Preston of Pepperdine.
Lawson had 18 rebounds in a game last year at Central Michigan and this season is the shortest player in Division I averaging at least eight rebounds.
And while Lawson is listed at 5-7, Hughes said the Lions are simply doing what most teams do and fudging a bit on her height. “She’s going to tell you she’s actually 6-5,” Hughes said. “But Jess is every bit of tiny.”
“I’m about 6-3 in real life,” Lawson joked before conceding 5-6 is more like it. How does she make that work against generally much taller players?
“I think with rebounding it’s all effort. And I have a good eye for the ball,” she said. “If you want to get the rebound, you’ll go get it. It’s all effort, no matter how tall you. I just run and go get it.”
The answer is simple, Hughes said. “Heart. It’s not the size of the dog in the fight, it’s the size of the heart in the dog,” she explained. “Jess has a motor like you can’t believe. She’s super fast. When you try to box Jess out, if you don’t find a way to get on her early, she moves so fast you can’t necessarily hit her.”
“I like to call her Big Dog just because on the inside she’s real tall. It’s her tenacity and how much she’s willing to give,” Hernandez said. “She’s been an amazing addition to our team, as a leader and on the floor. She’s really a light for our team. She’s always positive.”
Hughes understands what comes next will be as challenging as what the Lions have achieved so far: Dealing with success. It will take a dose of humility to keep working to improve and understand conference rivals will now begin to look at the Lions differently.
“When a program is getting some momentum, it’s about not losing the same motivation that got you there. If you’re not broken by the loss then you shouldn’t be distracted by the win,” she said. “Because if you’re truly focused on the process, then that’s the stuff we continue to preach.
“Before we break every huddle, we say, `Don’t play for the score, play for each other.’ That helps with a group that is trying to figure it out. If the main thing stays that, there’s no outcome that’s going to distract you.”
Hughes knows the usual suspects in the conference will continue to improve, regardless of how their seasons started.
“Teams can catch fire, especially new groups and young groups,” Hughes said. “By the time you get them on the back end (of the conference schedule), they look like totally different teams because you have veteran coaches who make sure that they set it up that way.
“So, it’s a scary conference, but also exciting. Do I think it’s wide open for anybody? Absolutely.”