Sports, Women's Basketball, Women's Sports

LBSU makes it four straight in win against Cal Poly

A fourth quarter comeback pushed the Long Beach State women’s basketball team past Cal Poly, 65-53, on Saturday night inside the Walter Pyramid.

The 49ers (16-5, 5-2) trailed by four at the end of the third quarter, but scored 21 points in the fourth to run away with the win.

Despite outscoring LBSU 48-44 through the first three quarters, the Mustangs (10-10, 3-4) only scored five points in the fourth.

“We had confidence going into the fourth quarter because I think we ended the third quarter aggressively,” 49er head coach Jody Wynn said. “And [we] continued to press and do what we do best.”

The 49ers started the game strong by taking an early 11-4 lead and by the end of the first quarter were leading 23-14. LBSU shot over 50 percent from the field and were 3-for-6 from behind the arc in the first.

LBSU lost the lead in the second and third quarters as the 49ers allowed Mustangs’ forward Hannah Gilbert and guard Dynn Leaupepe to find their rhythm. Both Gilbert and Leaupepe scored a combined 35 points in the the game.

“In the third quarter I think Gilbert still got two or three really easy shots, but our pressure on the perimeter was much better [in the fourth quarter],” Wynn said. “We contained 13 [Leaupepe] better so we didn’t create so many help and recover situations.”

After scoring only six points against UC Davis on Thursday, junior Madison Montgomery bounced back to her regular form and scored 18 points on Saturday, shooting eight for 14 from the field.

Montgomery put up the first points for the 49ers of the second half, but where she dominated was in the fourth quarter. The 6-foot-1-inch forward drained a clutch shot to give LBSU an eight point lead with 1:47 left in the game.

“I knew that they wanted to guard us on the perimeter,” Montgomery said. “I wanted to get in the gun and try to be a presence on the inside.”

Montgomery wasn’t the only player to score double digits. Sophomore guard Raven Benton scored 14 points and junior guard Anna Kim contributed with 10.

Sophomore guard Gigi Hascheff added two three-pointers, which included a trey that cut the Mustang lead to four in the middle of the third quarter.

Cal Poly assistant coach Kristin Iwanaga said that the offense was stagnant and that the 49er defense forced turnovers thanks to an on-and-off full court press.

Turnovers killed the Mustangs as the team had 29 turnovers throughout the game.

“We played three good quarters, it’s just the fourth quarter that we really kind of started to turn the ball over and couldn’t score offensively,” Iwanaga said. “We’ll go back and look at the game film and see what we can improve on.”

LBSU’s next game will be on Thursday at 7 p.m. at the Walter Pyramid against CSUN.

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