Nov. 5, 2011

Final Stats

DAVIS, Calif. - Kasey Riecks led all players with 23 points on 10-of-15 shooting while Hana Asano added 12 points, seven rebounds and seven assists as the UC Davis women's basketball team took a 72-54 exhibition win over Humboldt State at The Pavilion on Saturday night.

Riecks grabbed six rebounds and Brianna Salvatore added in eight points, hitting four-of-five shots from the field.

For Humboldt State, Kayla Williams and Caitie Richards each scored 12 points while Bree Halsey and Lisa Petty grabbed nine rebounds each.

"I thought we were just a little bit flat in the first half and I think that was just a little bit of first game jitters," said first-year head coach Jennifer Gross. "We did a tremendous job in the second half and a number of players really stepped up and gave us that spark."

The Aggies jumped to a an 18-11 with 10:44 to play, but Humboldt State chipped away at the deficit, using an 8-2 run to get within one point with 4:26 left in the half.

Riecks would take over for UC Davis as the first half came to a close, scoring six of UC Davis' final 10 points. She hit a three-pointer with 2:10 to go to give the Aggies a six-point lead, then added in a free throw as the Aggies took a 33-28 lead into the locker room.

"All of our veterans really contributed in their own way, but I felt like when we were flat, Kasey really stepped up and gave us a spark," said Gross. "Hana was just ice the whole game. She's our floor general out there and she got people the ball in positions where they could really be effective."

UC Davis opened the second half on a 16-3 run over the first eight minutes of the period. Back-to-back layups from Riecks and Samantha Meggison started things off and a three-point play from Asano a few minutes later gave the Aggies a 42-31 advantage.

The Aggie lead kept growing as Brianna Salvatore's layup put UC Davis up by 13 and Idit Oryon's three-pointer with 13:12 left to play added to the UC Davis lead. Cortney French poured in a trey of her own with 11:42 to go and freshman Sydnee Fipps hit the first shot of her Aggie career to extend UC Davis' lead to 20 points.

"The number one thing was our energy, without a doubt," said Gross. "We are a team that's going to need energy to play. We're talking, we're getting active, we're celebrating. We talked about being unified with our system offensively and in the second half we did a great job of looking more like a unit together. When we do that, we can do more things in transition."

Late in the game, Humboldt State hit a few shots in an attempt to close the gap, including a jumper from Lisa Petty and a three-pointer from Danielle Gaumer to bring the score to 57-41 with nine minutes to go.

UC Davis responded with fastbreak layups from Riecks and Emily Vann with six minutes left. Asano grabbed a defensive rebound with four minutes on the clock, then dished it out to a breaking Lauren Beyer who laid it in on the other end of the court. Beyer would also hit two free throws.

As a team, the Aggies shot 54.7 percent from the floor and were 7-of-13 from the free throw line. The Lumberjacks shot 31.7 percent from the field and hit 8-of-12 free throws.

UC Davis officially opens the 2011-12 season on Friday, Nov. 11 against Pac-12 powerhouse Washington in Seattle. Game time is set for 1 p.m.