Jan. 19, 2012

Box Score

SAN DIEGO, Calif. -The University of San Diego women's basketball team closed out the game on a 12-0 run to claim a hard fought 72-66 West Coast Conference win over visiting University of Portland Thursday evening at the Jenny Craig Pavilion.

With the win, the Toreros improve to 13-4 overall, move to 4-1 in the WCC and they have now won four of their last five games. With the loss, the Pilots fall to 8-13 overall and 1-6 in the WCC.

"I was really impressed with our defense down the stretch, as we switched up our defenses and our kids just executed them to perfection, and I thought it really, really helped," stated head coach Cindy Fisher. "I thought Morgan Woodrow, stepped up big there at the end and hit some big shots for us, and I thought tonight was just a really good team effort with key minutes off the bench from Nicole Ballestero, and Kameron Knutson."

Woodrow led all payers with her 24 points on 8-for-17 shooting form the field, including going 4-for-7 from beyond the arc. Conners scored her 18 points on 4-of-14 shooting from the field, and she went 9-for-12 from the charity stripe. With the 18 points, Conners has now tied Susie Erpelding for second all-time in career points with 1,510 career points. The final USD player to record double digits was Izzy Chilcott, who scored 11 on 5-of-8 shooting from the field, while pulling down five rebounds. As a team, USD shot .417 form the field and were out rebounded 34-28.

In the first half, USD grabbed the first four points of the game, then went cold from the field not hitting a single basket for an eight-minute block of time, while the pilots took advantage of that and went on a 12-0 to take a 12-04 lead with 10:51 to go. USD finally broke the scoreless streak with a Chilcott jumper at the 9:49 mark to spark a 9-4 USD run pulling the Toreros to within one at 19-18 with 5:52 to go. USD then kept the momentum going as they used a 13-4 run to take their biggest lead of the half at 32-23 with 1:29 to go. However, the Pilots then closed out the half on a 9-0 run to go in the break all tied up at 32-apiece.

In the second half, a Woodrow 3-pointer jump started a 10-6 Torero run to give USD back a 7-point edge at 45-38 with 17:20 to go. USD would maintain that seven-point edge over the next six minutes before the Pilots began to chip away at the lead. Portland would come all the way back and tie the game with 56-all on a Natalie Day jumper with 7:16 to go. Portland would then go on to build up their lead to as many as six at 66-60 with 4:23 to go. However USD would not be denied, as they dug in and closed out the game on a 12-0 run to claim the 72-66 win.

For the Pilots, Day led the scoring effort with 21 points on 7-of-14 shooting, while Cassandra Brown had 17 points and Kari Luttinen was the final Pilot in double figures at 11 points. As a team, Portland shot .511 from the field.

USD will return to action on Saturday as they host No. 25 Gonzaga in a 2 p.m. WCC game inside the friendly confines of the Jenny Craig Pavilion.