SAN DIEGO — With four seconds left on the clock, San Francisco forward Mikayla Williams leaned in and fired a three from the top of the arc.
 
At the end of a game that saw 10 lead changes and 10 ties, it was Williams — a forward by trade who hit a trio of 3-pointers Thursday at BYU — who got the would-be game-winner. It clanked off the back iron, and the Dons lost to the University of San Diego, 54-50.
 
After transferring from UC San Diego to San Francisco this offseason, Williams has become an all-around star and a leader on a young team hobbled by injury. On Saturday, in her first return to the city that was her home for three years, she showed why she's who the Dons want to have the ball with the game on the line.
 
"As much as a forward can think like a point guard, she does," said head coach Molly Goodenbour. "Those 3-pointers, she's starting to expand her game, and we're encouraging her to do that."
 
A two-time Division II All-American for UCSD, Williams has averaged 14.3 points and 8.9 rebounds for the Dons this season, and led San Francisco with 16 points and nine boards on Saturday, to go along with two assists and two blocks in 39 minutes. She was one of four Dons to play at least 32.
 
When she transferred to San Francisco late last spring, Williams not only wanted to challenge herself at the Division I level, but to ready herself for the professional game. With more than half of the Dons' roster unavailable for much of this season due to injury or illness, she's had to diversify her skill set out of necessity: Of the eight players available on Saturday, only two were guards.
 
"I really have to kind of step up my game to be more of a threat outside and inside," Williams said. "I was doing really great inside in D2, and it was really comfortable, but I knew I'd have to be more aggressive on drives and pull-up jumpers and all that. Coming USF has allowed me to expand that portion of my game."
 
Her 3-point try at the end of regulation wasn't an ideal look, but it's one she's earned.
 
Having not taken one 3-pointer during her final season in San Diego, she's stayed after practice with USF assistant Arthur Moreira and worked on her 3-point shot this season, despite taking only three attempts before Thursday's 3-for-7 outburst.
 
On Saturday, in addition to a pair of 3-point tries, Williams did what she's done for much of the year: She grabbed tough rebounds, she scored driving to the lane, she hit pull-ups up from the elbow and found space from the wing against the Toreros, with two of her former UC San Diego teammates — Joleen Yang and Shandiin Amaro — cheering her on.
 
"She's been everything that we recruited her to be," Goodenbour said. "If we can get her comfortable facing the basket and taking some 3-point shots and expanding that part of her game, I think that will benefit us, but it'll certainly benefit her in her pursuit of a professional career."
 
It still wasn't enough. With a shortened and fatigued rotation, San Francisco pulled down just nine offensive rebounds to San Diego's 15, and the Toreros scored 17 second-chance points, 12 coming in the second half.
 
"One of their strengths is offensive rebounding," Goodenbour said. "They know that if they don't score that first shot, they can go in and pretty reliably get a second chance out of it. They really crash and work hard from all positions, and I do think that we're fatigued, and we're a little bit undersized."
 
In an unexpected turn, most of those second-chance points came from beyond the arc. Over the first 16 games of the season, San Diego had hit seven or more 3-pointers just once. Saturday marked the Toreros' third such game out of their last four, as they went 8-for-19 from long distance, despite shooting just 31.7% (20-of-63) from the field.
 
Williams (7 for 15), Lucie Hoskova (12 points on 5-of-12 shooting) and Leilah Vigil (11 points, 8 rebounds) provided much of the offense for San Francisco. Of Williams' nine rebounds, eight came on the defensive end, preventing any more second-chance opportunities for the Toreros.
Williams scored four of the Dons' first 10 points in a tumultuous first quarter that saw San Francisco turn the ball over seven times against a high-pressure San Diego defense that pressed full court almost from the opening possession. One of just three seniors on a team stocked with eight sophomores, she helped calm the Dons down, and they turned the ball over only seven more times the rest of the game.
 
In the third quarter — where San Francisco has struggled during their now-nine-game conference skid — Williams pulled down five boards and blocked a would-be 3-point try as the Dons kept pace.
 
"She's a really good floor leader," Goodenbour said. "She knows the plays we're running, she knows matchups, she's a great communicator. She understands how to convey what we're trying to do on the court. She's always very engaged and very in tune to that. I think she takes pride in that role. I think that we really count on her."