Box Score

DAVIS, Calif. -- UC Davis senior Sydnee Fipps finished with a team-high 21 points, including a clutch floater in the final two minutes to give the Aggies some breathing room, while classmate Kelsey Harris added 15 more, helping lift their team to a 60-53 victory over Pacific in a match-up of former conference rivals on Saturday night at The Pavilion.

UC Davis won its second straight contest in improving to 3-2 overall on the season, shooting 45 percent from the floor and hitting on better than 56 percent of its three-point attempts for the game. The Tigers, led by Hailie Eackles' career-high 24 points, fell to 3-2 on the year.

"It's always such a fun game, I feel like emotions run so high, it just feels like a playoff atmosphere," Head Coach Jennifer Gross said. "We always know we're going to get their best effort and they're going to get ours and, somehow, it always comes down to the wire."

Fipps hit 6-of-13 from the field and grabbed eight rebounds to finish with 20-or-more points for the second time this season and the 25th time in her career -- just six shy of Staci Stevens' career record of 31 set from 1984-88). Harris hit four three-pointers -- including a huge trey with 2:14 remaining to snap a 51-all tie -- and was 3-for-4 from the line en route to her total.

Following a stretch that saw both teams go scoreless for more than five minutes, a nip-and-tuck battle had UC Davis up seven at 45-38 with just under eight minutes to play, but Pacific would not go quietly. Back-to-back three-pointers by Madison Parrish and Eackles brought the visitors to within one, and Kendall Kenyon capped an 8-0 run with a basket inside off a dish from Parrish to put the Tigers in front.

Junior Alyson Doherty, who finished with eight points, a game-high nine rebounds, and a team-high five assists, answered on the other end with a basket inside, and Harris hit both ends of a one-and-one to rebuild a three-point advantage, but Eackles nailed her fifth three-pointer of the night to tie the game at 49. Rachel Nagel drained a pair from the line for teammate Celia Marfone, who left the game with an injury, and Kenyon scored inside to bring Pacific even, before Harris drained her fourth three-pointer of the night, giving the Aggies the lead for good.

Eackles had a chance to tie it after absorbing a foul on the right corner three-point attempt, but hit just 2-of-3 from the line before Fipps' 10-foot rainbow dropped through with 1:39 to play. Both Nafekh and Fipps then closed with a pair of free throws apiece after missed three-point attempts to secure the victory.

"Early on, we were just being passive, we weren't passing the ball sharply, purposefully," Gross said. "We tried to space the floor a little bit differently in the second half and we were asking our players to make plays. We went with a couple different lineups, put some different ball handlers in there and, I thought, a couple different people stepped up. Once we got the ball, we tried to attack a little bit more, be smart, and make good decisions."

UC Davis trailed by as many as four points midway through the opening half, but four points from Marfone and a three-pointer by Harris capped a 9-0 burst turned the tables, and the Aggies led by as many as five points on four occasions before taking a two-point, 30-28, lead into the locker room at the break.

The Aggies shot better than 40 percent from the field for the fourth consecutive game, while the 9-of-16 from three-point range (.563) was a season high.

UC Davis' season-long four-game home stand comes to an end on Tuesday (Dec. 2), as the Aggies welcome their second straight West Coast Conference opponent to The Pavilion in San Francisco for a 7 p.m. tip-off.

UC DAVIS 60, PACIFIC 53

PACIFIC (3-2)
EACKLES, Hailie 8-20 3-5 24; KENYON, Kendall 4-9 1-2 9; PARRISH, Madison 2-7 0-1 6; BUTLER, Erin 2-5 0-2 6; JOHNSON, Kristina 2-7 0-0 4; COLEMAN, Unique 1-7 0-0 2; FINNIE, Desire 1-4 0-0 2; CONRICODE, Claire 0-0 0-0 0; LUAULU-SUMMERS, G. 0-1 0-0 0; SIMONS, Emily 0-1 0-0 0; JOHNSON, Gena 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 20-61 4-10 53.

UC DAVIS (3-2)
Fipps, Sydnee 6-13 6-8 21; Harris, Kelsey 4-6 3-4 15; Doherty, Alyson 3-8 2-2 8; Marfone, Celia 3-5 0-0 7; Nafekh, Dani 1-1 2-2 5; Nagel, Rachel 0-0 2-4 2; Salvatore, Brianna 1-2 0-2 2; McGuire, Taylor 0-0 0-0 0; Beyer, Lauren 0-2 0-0 0; Gianotti, Pele 0-2 0-0 0; Yasukochi, Brianne 0-1 0-0 0; Johnson, Heidi 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 18-40 15-22 60.

Pacific.......................... 28 25 - 53
UC Davis......................... 30 30 - 60

3-point goals--Pacific 9-31 (EACKLES, Hailie 5-17; PARRISH, Madison 2-6; BUTLER, Erin 2-5; COLEMAN, Unique 0-1; LUAULU-SUMMERS, G. 0-1; KENYON, Kendall 0-1), UC Davis 9-16 (Harris, Kelsey 4-6; Fipps, Sydnee 3-7; Marfone, Celia 1-1; Nafekh, Dani 1-1; Gianotti, Pele 0-1). Fouled out--Pacific-None, UC Davis-None. Rebounds--Pacific 37 (KENYON, Kendall 9), UC Davis 34 (Doherty, Alyson 9). Assists--Pacific 14 (PARRISH, Madison 6), UC Davis 14 (Doherty, Alyson 5). Total fouls--Pacific 19, UC Davis 16. Technical fouls--Pacific-None, UC Davis-None.