Forward Nicole Strasko had her second straight strong outing with a 20-point effort but the Central College women's basketball team suffered an 80-69 defeat against Buena Vista Univ. Wednesday night.

Strasko, who had 17 points in a loss at Dubuque Monday, sank 9 of 11 free throws and had five rebounds.

But after keeping it close early, Central trailed by as many as 27 points in the second half, getting outscored 21-6 in the first 8 minutes of the period after being down 38-26 at intermission.

The Dutch did find some late spark, using a 17-4 burst to close to within 73-62 with 1:30 remaining.

"We started to play at about the 5-minute mark," coach Jerry Nikkel said. "If we had played that way the entire game, it might have been a different story, but we were pretty lethargic."

Nikkel did see some promise on the defensive end.

"I thought we played pretty good defense in the first half," he said.

Freshman guard Annie Sarcone had 12 points while forward Haley Brillhart had nine points and seven rebounds. Forward AJ  Baker also had seven boards.

The Dutch were outshot 40.6 percent to 37.5 percent and outrebounded 45-39.

Central plays host to Loras College in a women's-men's doubleheader Saturday at P.H. Kuyper Gym starting at 2 p.m. The Dutch were defeated at Loras Dec. 1, 74-51. The Duhawks are 8-9 overall and 4-4 in the league after a 71-49 setback at Coe College Wednesday night.

It will be Central's third game in six days.

"We'll go easy tomorrow in practice—we'll have to," Nikkel said. "It's a really tough week."

A video webstream and live stats for both Central games Saturday will be available through the Dutch athletics website at www.central.edu/athletics.