The Long Beach State women’s basketball team benefitted from a dismal shooting performance by UC Davis Thursday night at the Walter Pyramid.
The 49ers converted more field goals in the first half than the Aggies made in the entire game.
The ‘Niners (11-14, 6-6 Big West Conference) won their second straight contest, defeating Davis (15-9, 7-5) after the Aggies experienced a horrendous shooting night, 67-55.
The Beach jumped out to an early lead by knocking down a few shots from 3-point range and forcing turnovers. LBSU held the Aggies to just 7 field goals in the first half and took a 37-26 lead into the break.
Just when the night seemingly could not get any worse for Davis, the shooting became even more dreadful in the second half as the Aggies converted a woeful 20.7 percent (6-for-29) from the field.
UC Davis had a stretch spanning both halves where it did not convert a field goal for 11:17. Had it not been for free-throws (Davis was 23-29 on the night), the game would never have been close.
LBSU out-shot the Aggies 39.3 percent to 24.7 percent for the game.
The Beach expanded the lead to as many as 15 before the Davis free throw barrage was able to bring the lead back down to three.
The game never had much of a flow as both teams committed 24 turnovers on the night.
LBSU head coach Jody Wynn was not particularly happy with the team’s shot selection in the first half.
“We shot a lot of threes,” she said. “In the second half they made their run. When you’ve got five players on the floor that can shoot the three and five players that can put the ball on the floor, that’s tough to guard.”
Wynn added: “We started attacking the paint more with drives and penetrating passes and got ourselves to the free-throw line. We had a lot of paint touches which we needed.”
Senior forward Tipesa Moorer and freshman guard Alex Sanchez led the LBSU attack and found ways to fend-off each run the Aggies attempted to make.
Moorer led the ‘Niners in scoring with 15 points to go along with five rebounds and four assists.
Sanchez knocked down three shots from beyond the arc en route to 13 points, six assists and four rebounds.
“They went on their run but thankfully we knew how to stop the bleeding,” Sanchez said. “We were just mentally prepared, so whenever we’re prepared we come out with confidence.”
Freshman Chantel Dooley tacked on 11 for The Beach to join Moorer and Sanched in double-figures. The freshman guard also pulled down a game-high nine rebounds to go with three steals.
The Aggies were paced by senior guard Samantha Meggison, who scored a game-high 20 points to go with eight rebounds, two seals and an assist.
The Beach returns to action Saturday when it hosts Big West rival the University of the Pacific at 4 p.m.