On Thursday evening, the University of Redlands women's basketball program won its fifth-consecutive contest to open the 2012-13 campaign, defeating Caltech by a score of 70-49 in Pasadena. In a game that saw the Maroon and Gray use 13 players, the team climbed out of an early hole en route to the 21-point Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SCIAC) victory.
The triumph gives the Bulldogs their hottest start during Head Coach Rich Murphy's six-year career.
After just two minutes of action, Redlands faced a six-point deficit against the Beavers. Not fazed, however, the Bulldogs looked to junior forwardBrittany Oster (Agoura Hills, CA) to score timely baskets while leading a 16-0 run by the Bulldogs, which allowed them to regain control of the game with an 18-8 lead. Oster went on to finish the night with a solid double-double with 19 points and 11 boards.
Building on this momentum, freshman forward Ashton Beth (Windsor, CA) provided a spark off the bench and hit three shots in a three-minute span, which helped to increase the Bulldogs' advantage.
With just under five minutes remaining in the first stanza, sophomore forwardVianna Amabile (Temecula, CA) drained a shot from beyond the arc to push the Maroon and Gray's lead to 14 points. On the night, she also nabbed two rebounds while dishing out two assists and recording two steals.
The Beavers fought to keep it close throughout the game, eventually cutting the Redlands lead to 10 points with less than seven minutes to go in the second half.
However, the Bulldogs quickly answered when junior guard Marika Staton(El Centro, CA) and junior forward Madison Sanders-Curry (San Jose, CA) each scored crucial baskets to put the game out of reach en route to the opening SCIAC victory of the year for the Bulldogs.
Sanders-Curry finished with six points and five rebounds off the bench while Staton tallied eight total points to go along with eight boards. Additionally, senior guard Ashley Sevilla (San Diego, CA) hit three shots from downtown to contribute 11 points. The floor general, junior guard Colleen Goeser(San Carlos, CA), racked up four assists and four rebounds on top of scoring nine points on the evening.
The Bulldogs (5-0, 1-0 SCIAC) return home on Saturday evening to take on the Sagehens of Pomona-Pitzer Colleges in a SCIAC doubleheader. The women's contest tips off at 5 p.m., with the men following at approximately 7 p.m. in Currier Gym.