Jan. 12, 2008

Final Stats

LAS CRUCES, N.M. - Senior forward Jamelah Brown scored a game-high 14 points in a losing effort as New Mexico State defeated the Utah State women's basketball team, 71-56, Saturday evening at NMSU's Pan American Center.

Senior guard Taylor Richards tallied 11 points to give her 1,001 for her career, becoming the fifth player in USU history to reach the 1,000 point milestone. Senior center Jenny Gross grabbed a team-high eight rebounds and Brown added seven rebounds as USU out-rebounded NMSU, 39-32.

The loss snapped a three-game winning streak for Utah State as USU falls to 6-9 on the season and 2-1 in WAC action, while NMSU improves to 13-3 overall and 3-0 in the league. New Mexico State holds the series lead, 14-9, as NMSU snapped a USU three-game winning streak.

Anikia Jawara scored 19 points for NMSU, while Sherell Neal tallied 18 points and added six rebounds. Madison Spence scored eight points and pulled down a team-high seven rebounds for New Mexico State.

Utah State scored the first bucket of the game on a jumper by Brown, as USU went on a 9-4 run to go up 18-10 with 11:55 left to play in the first half. USU led through the majority of the first half before NMSU capitalized on free throws in the last minute with Neal hitting two and Hannah Spanich scored three free throws, as New Mexico State took a 30-27 lead at the half.

NMSU went on a 27-10 run to open up the second half at 57-39 with 8:09 left to play. New Mexico State continued to control the half and took its largest lead of 19 points at 71-52 with 45 seconds left to play as Utah State scored the last four points of the game.

Utah State finished the game by shooting 30.4 percent from the field (21-of-69) including 6-of-18 (33.3 percent) from three-point range and shot 88.9 percent (8-of-9) from behind the free throw line. New Mexico State shot 55.3 percent (26-of-47) including 1-of-5 (20.0 percent) from behind the three-point arc and 85.7 percent (18-of-21) at the charity stripe.

USU continues its three-game road stretch at defending WAC champion Boise State (9-6, 1-2 WAC) on Thursday, Jan. 17 at 7 p.m., in BSU's Taco Bell Arena.

All the Utah State games can be heard on KLGN (1390 AM) in Logan with Evan Nyman calling the play-by-play and former USU women's basketball player Ashley Rutledge will be providing color commentary for home games. They can also be heard on the web, through Yahoo! Sports, by going to the Utah State Athletic home page at www.UtahStateAggies.com and clicking on the Yahoo! Sports link in the right hand column.