Riverside, CA—The UC Riverside Women's Basketball team hits the road this week for games at Cal State Fullerton Thursday, February 11 at 7 pm and Saturday the 13th at Cal Poly.
The Highlanders (15-7, 8-0) held steady on their home court last week with wins over UC Davis (
80-73) and CSUN (83-76).
Against the Matadors Saturday night, UCR recorded a season-high 17 steals and held off a fourth quarter charge to hang on for the, 83-76, victory.
(box score/
recap/
video highlights)
Michelle Curry scored a career-high 24 points on 9-of-11 shooting, dished out four assists and picked up three steals. Brittany Crain had 21 points, six rebounds, and Rejane Verin nearly logged her third straight double double with 16 points, 9 boards.
Crain, the reigning
Big West Player of the Week, averaged 22 points, 7.5 rebounds in leading the team to a 2-0 week. She also tied the schools all-time career mark for made three-pointers with 212, as well as helped the team continue to make history with an 8-0 start to conference play. Her 20.0 points per game scoring average ranks 30th in nation.
The Highlanders have just eight available players for the remainder of the season. Senior Annelise Ito played just nine minutes against CSUN Saturday night, before going down with an injury while driving to the basket—she is still being evaluated at this time.
As a team, UCR's ranks
5th in the nation in assists per game with 19.5, and is
35th in three-point field goal percentage with a 35.0 percent connect rate.
Cal State Fullerton (2-21, 0-9) won its first two games of the season, but has since lost 21 straight.
In their last game, they were defeated at home by UC Davis, however the four point margin of defeat (63-59) was the smallest in Big West play thus far. They connected on 12-of-36 three-point attempts at Titan gym Saturday.
Michelle Berry's 17-point, 11-rebound double double led the Titans, who also got four three-pointers from Samantha Logan (14pts), three from Portia Neale (11pts) and three from Dani Craig (9pts) in the loss.
Berry leads the conference in rebounding at 9.2 per contest and is third in scoring at 14.7, behind UCR's Crain (20.0) and Verin (17.5). Craig is second in the conference with 49 made three-pointers and Logan is tied for fourth with 47.
The Highlanders lead the overall series, 24-22 (
view results). The teams split the regular season series, with each winning at home. They last met in the Big West tournament on March 10, 2015, when the Titans knocked off the Highlanders, 71-59, in the opening round. (
box score/
recap)
Cal Poly (11-11, 4-5) is coming off a home win over UC Irvine, 50-38—the fewest points allowed by the Mustangs in three years. They held the Anteaters to two single digit-scoring quarters, six in the second and eight in the third.
Before welcoming the Highlanders to town, Cal Poly will travel to face UC Davis Wednesday night. Hannah Gilbert leads the Mustangs, averaging 12.9 points and 9.5 rebounds per game.
UCR leads the all-time series, 34-33, after prevailing in their first meeting this season, 93-83. (
view results)
