Claremont, Calif. - The La Verne Women's Basketball team used a late first-half run to take an 11-point lead at the break and held off Pomona-Pitzer the rest of the way for a 69-55 win on Wednesday evening at Voelkel Gymnasium. 

With the win, La Verne improves to 4-8 overall and 1-2 in the SCIAC, while the Sagehens fall to 2-9 overall and 1-1 in league play after starting out with a 61-56 road win over Occidental on Saturday. 

Sophomore forward Basha Brulee-Wills had a strong effort for Pomona-Pitzer with 13 points and 14 rebounds. However, Emily Myers had 21 points and 14 rebounds to lead the way for La Verne, while Kayla Valentine (15 points) and Ashley Breshears (10 points) helped the Leopards earn 33 points off their bench. 

La Verne closed out the first half on a 9-2 run to take a 41-30 lead into the break and started the second half with a three-pointer from Taylor Bolden to stretch the lead to 14. The Leopards built it to as many as 19 points with 9:30 to go (58-39), before an 8-0 run got the Sagehens back within 11 with 6:23 left on a pair of foul shots from Kacie Hitomi. 

However, Myers answered with a pair of transition baskets to push the lead back to 15, and Pomona-Pitzer was unable to get the lead down to single digits. Hitomi finished with 10 points for the Sagehens to join Brulee-Wills in double figures. 

Pomona-Pitzer is back in action on Saturday when it hosts Cal Lutheran for a 2 p.m. contest.    

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