SEATTLE — The Washington Huskies women's basketball team began Monday ranked No. 25 in the country. They ended the day with a dominant 87-56 win against the Montana Grizzlies at Alaska Airlines Arena in Seattle.

It was a balanced effort for the Huskies, who had three players reach double-figures and eight players with five or more rebounds.

"So many good things, first of all," Washington coach Tina Langley said after the game. "Our minds as coaches go to the things where — 'Wow, tomorrow we got to work on some things.' But the great thing is you saw a lot of people play a lot of positions and do things that we've been practicing. You got to see them execute at a high level at times. ... I could really see our communication changing. The way we share the basketball, the way we're defending."

The Huskies had control of the game almost from the opening tip.

Senior Washington center Yulia Grabovskaia scored in the paint with 9:43 left in the first quarter to put her team up 4-2. The Huskies had the lead for the rest of the game. They on a 17-8 run after that point and led 21-10 at the end of the first quarter.

Grabovskaia ended the game with 14 points on a 6-for-7 clip from the floor and had eight rebounds, three assists and a steal.

The Husky defense stonewalled the Grizzlies in the second quarter. Washington held Montana to nine points and put up another 21 points to go into halftime with a 42-19 lead.

The Huskies defense took away shot opportunities from the Grizzlies from inside the paint. Of Montana's 62 shot attempts, 40 were from beyond the arc. The Grizzlies went 18-for-62 (29%) from the floor and 13-for-40 (33%) from 3-point range.

"I think they adjusted well to the way we defended in the first half," Langley said. "We obviously made it an emphasis that we didn't want them to score in the paint. Obviously they have some talented players at getting downhill. ... I think we definitely had a vision for trying to stop that."

In the first half, freshman forward Brynn McGaughy and junior guard Sayvia Sellers led the way on offense with 10 and nine points, respectively.

Sellers finished with a game-high 19 points on 8-for-13 shooting (3-for-6 from beyond the arc) and had five assists.

McGaughy finished the game with 12 points on 4-for-7 shooting and had five rebounds, an assist, a block and a steal.

The quantity of 3-point attempts from Montana led to more rebound opportunities and second-chance points for Washington.

The Huskies out-rebounded the Grizzlies 60-23 and had 16 second-chance points.

"Obviously me and Yulia — she's my post," Sellers said in a postgame interview. "So we have a good connection so far and it's been getting a lot better. But yeah, we try to push pace. We're still learning how to play off each other but I thought today was really good for the both of us. She got me quite a bit of assists."

The Grizzlies were more competitive in the second half but were still outscored by Washington 45-37 for the eventual final of 87-56.

The Huskies' next game will be on the road against Utah at 1 p.m. PT on Nov. 15 in Salt Lake City.

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