Dec. 22, 2009
Box Score
Fresno, Calif. - Traveling to the central valley to take on the Bulldogs of Fresno State, the Pacific women's basketball team suffered a 63-33 loss on Tuesday, December 22.
The loss dropped the Tigers to 1-8 on the year while the Bulldogs improved to 8-4.
Senior Jasmine Dana (Bakersfield, Calif.) led the Tigers with 11 points on 4-of-9 shooting from the floor.
What started off as a fight for possession with senior Emma Head (San Diego, Calif.) giving the tip-off to the Bulldogs who intentionally kicked the ball out of bounds, Fresno State came out on top first, scoring the first two points at 18:25 off a lay-up from Jenna Furst.
Down 2-0, the Tigers took the lead at 18:11 when freshman Kendall Rodriguez (La Habra, Calif.) chipped in Pacific's first three pointer of the game. That gave the Tigers a 3-2 lead within the game's first three minutes. But Fresno State tried to reclaim the lead, steadily doing so until the 13:54 mark, when the Bulldogs pulled out on top 7-3 after a jumper from Marnique Arnold.
But the Tigers were able to come back and knot the game up again at 12:11 after a pair of successful free throw shots from sophomore Christina Thompson (Sacramento, Calif.). When Fresno State hit double digits first at 10:01, Head retaliated with a layup at 9:26 to put Pacific back within one point, trailing 10-9.
From there Fresno State turned on its game, taking a 17-7 run to close out the first half that saw the Bulldogs leading 27-16. Fresno State padded its lead up to a quick 10 points with 2:05 remaining in the first half, when Hayley Munro, the game's leading scorer with 13 points and 10 rebounds, chipped in a layup.
Pacific cut the deficit back down under 10 points when Head put in another Tiger layup that saw Pacific trail 24-16, within eight points of Fresno State. But the final lead of the first stanza came from Jaleesa Ross, when a pair of free throws gave the Bulldogs their 27-16 lead to close out the half.
To start out the second half, Fresno State pulled away again, sealing the victory with a 22-4 run in the first 15 minutes of the half to trail 51-20. Dana, who was just one point shy of a career high with 11 points, started to put Pacific back on the board after that run, after completing a three-point play from the floor and free throw line. That cut the deficit 51-23. Junior Arielle White (Los Angeles, Calif.) saw time in a contest for the second game this season, and scored a three-pointer at 5:03 to cut the lead 53-26.
The Bulldogs scored 27 points off of Pacific's 32 turnovers. Dana finished as the Tigers' leading scorer with 11 points, while Thompson finished second behind her with eight total points.
The Tigers next return to action for their final game of the 2009 calendar year, when they host Saint Mary's from the Spanos Center on Tuesday, Dec. 29 for a 7 p.m. tip-off. With the start of 2010, the Tigers head down to Southern California for the start of Big West Conference play.
