Orange Coast College

Women's Basketball: Second-half outburst lifts Pirates past Gauchos

Wednesday, January 14, 2009

COSTA MESA -- A 34-26 halftime deficit was quickly erased by the hot-and-cold Orange Coast College offense as the women's basketball team posted a 67-54 Orange Empire Conference win over visiting Saddleback on Wednesday night.

OCC (15-6, 2-0 in conference) outscored the Gauchos 41-20 in the second half as the defensive intensity rose with the offensive success.

Casey Gomez led the Pirates with 19 points, five assists and three steals, while Simone Ibbotson added 15 points and six rebounds. From the outside, Chelsea Alfafara was OCC's big weapon, hitting four 3-pointers en route to 13 points off the bench.

The balanced scoring helped offset the offensive barrage thrown in by Saddleback's Keisha Cox, who led all scorers with 27 points and 10 rebounds. However, it wasn't as easy as it sounded as OCC's defense forced 28 Gaucho turnovers, including nine by Cox.

Saddleback (8-9, 1-1) came out strong in the first half, hitting 14-of-22 from the field and out-rebounded the Pirates 21-12, jumping out to a 34-26 lead at the half.

An 11-2 run -- highlighted by four points off of defensive turnovers -- pushed OCC into the lead, 37-36, with 15:55 left.

The lead exchanged hands five times midway through the second before a 14-2 Pirates' run gave the home team the lead for good. Jenna Lujan, who finished with nine points, four rebounds and four steals, highlighted off the run with a big offensive rebound, basket and foul for a three-point play.

The rebounding edge was OCC's in the second half, out-boarding the Gauchos 18-12. After hitting 63.6 percent of their shots in the first half, the Gauchos were held to just 7-of-20 (35 percent) from the field in the second half.

OCC returns to action on Friday at Cypress, beginning at 5:30 p.m. The Pirates' next home game will be on Friday, Jan. 23 against Riverside, also at 5:30.