Jan. 20, 2011

Box Score

GRAND FORKS, N.D. -- For the first time since meeting in the Great West Conference championship game last year, Utah Valley and North Dakota hooked up again on the basketball court Thursday night, but this time the outcome was just the opposite.

The Wolverines, the defending GWC champions, couldn't overcome a cold start in dropping a 69-52 league contest to the Fighting Sioux.

Last year in Orem, the Wolverines capped their season on a five-game winning streak with a 70-62 victory over the Fighting Sioux in the title contest.

Thursday, however, the Wolverines shot just 32.7 percent from the field for the game, and were plagued by 26 turnovers.

"It wasn't because we didn't get good looks," UVU coach Cathy Nixon said. "I thought we got really good looks in the first five minutes. It was a tale of turnovers really. We gave them so many second chances with our lack of taking care of the ball."

With the loss, the Wolverines fall to 2-15 overall and 0-2 in Great West Conference play, while UND improved to 6-11 and 2-0 in league play.

Jenna Johnson paced the Wolverines with 15 points, while Sammie Jensen posted her seventh double-double of the year with 12 points and 13 rebounds and Kaycee Mansfield added 12.

After tying the score at 2-2 with 18:27 left in the first half, the Wolverines went cold. UVU went the next eight minutes without scoring a point, while in the meantime the Fighting Sioux built a 17-2 advantage.

Mansfield broke the drought with just over 10 minutes to play in the half to start an 11-2 UVU run. Following Mansfield's 3-ball and a UND bucket, the Wolverines rattled off the next nine points on two 3-pointers by Johnson and a 3-pointer by Abbie Beutler.

Johnson's trey with 8:33 left in the half cut the lead to six at 19-13. Three minutes later, the UND lead as still six at 22-16, but the Wolverines scored just three points -- a 3-pointer by Johnson -- in the final 6:45 and trailed 32-19 at the break.

A cold streak continued to haunt the Wolverines in the second half, managing just five points in the first five minutes and trailed by as many as 18.

Thanks to five quick points by Mansfield and two foul shots by Jensen the Wolverines had the UND lead down to 12 with 2:26 left, but they wouldn't get any closer.

"We created some things and got some easier looks offensively because we created some things defensively," Nixon said. "For this young team and their inexperience they haven't quite learned to compete for 40 minutes. We're focusing on the process on both ends of the floor."

Due to the slow start the Wolverines shot just 25.9 percent from the field and four of UVU's seven first-half field goals came from behind the arc.

The Fighting Sioux, however, shot 52.2 percent in the first half, despite shooting just 28.6 percent from 3-point territory.

Allyssa Wall led the Fighting Sioux, who shot 47.9 percent from the floor for the game, with 16 points.

The Wolverines are back in action Saturday night when they meet the University of South Dakota in Vermillion.