W Basketball: Rustlers Dominate the Boards as they Win their Fourth in a Row

Huntington Beach, Calif. - Despite 19 turnovers the Rustlers won a wire-to-wire game against the visiting Cuyamaca College Coyotes 67-47 Thursday night. 

Golden West opened the game on a 14 to 4 run, led by Vanessa Epperson who chipped in five and Fama Diagne who added four. With 7:03 to go in the second quarter the Coyotes went on a 5-0 run with a pair of buckets and a free throw from Sowunmi Namaya, cutting the Rustlers lead to seven 22-15. The Rustlers then answered with a 7-0 run of their own to restore the double-digit lead. Ivette Salcedo got it started with a pair of layups on back-to-back possessions followed by a 3-point corner dagger from Sheridan Bivens to push the lead back to 14 with 2:56 to go in the half. Cuyamaca clawed back cutting the lead to 31-21 at half.  

The Coyotes came out on fire in the second half scoring the first seven points to make it a three-point game. The Rustlers responded with a 16-2 run of their own led by Armine Israyelyn who scored five points and Bivens who buried another corner dagger three-pointer for a 42-30 lead.

The pesky Coyotes would not go down quietly and mounted one more run, cutting the lead back to nine at 53-44 with 7:07 on the clock in fourth quarter. Golden West answered the call with another impressive 14-3 run to finish out the game to prevail victorious 67-47.  

The Coyotes came into the game ranked No. 13 in the state in rebounding and No. 10 in the state in three-point field goal percentage but were out rebounded by the Rustler's 56 to 23 and held to 18.8 percent behind the arc. The Coyotes had three players in double digits including game leading scorer Namaya who had 17. Anthony Glen and Tia Saunders added 10 apiece. 

The Rustlers were led by Sheridan Bivens with 11 points with Israyelyan and Epperson chipping in 10 point each in the winning effort.

Golden West will be back in action on at home on Tuesday, December 6 when they host Palo Verde College at 7pm.