Fourth Quarter Rally Spurs Evergreen Victory
PORTLAND, Ore. - Trailing by one point with four minutes remaining, The Evergreen State College outscored host Warner Pacific by 11 points down the stretch in taking a 67-57 women's basketball victory on Friday night at Bart Valentine Court.
The Geoducks (2-2 overall, 1-0 CCC) won the conference opener for both teams by rallying after trailing the Knights (2-7, 0-1) at various points in the second, third and fourth quarters.
Warner Pacific took a 55-54 lead on a pair of Bailey Allen free throw with 4:05 remaining, but from that point on the Geoducks took control. Cherish Moss scored on a layin and Japhera McEachin followed with a three-point basket before Michaela Pin hit a jumper for the Knights to make it 59-57 in Evergreen's favor. Pin's basket came with three minutes to play and was the last point the hosts would score. Over the next three minutes they turned the ball over twice and missed five field goal attempts, four of them from three-point range, in addition to missing twice from the free throw line.
In the meantime, Deidra Miller scored a layin and Cayla Jones hit two free throws before McEachin closed out the scoring with a layin and two free throws.
McEachin ended up leading four Evergreen players in double figures, scoring 16 points on 5-for-10 shooting from the field and 5-for-5 from the charity stripe. Alexcis Higginbotham notched a double-double with 14 points and 10 rebounds, Moss scored 14 points, including 7-for-8 at the foul line, and Imani Dunn added 12 points and eight rebounds.
The Geoducks trailed 27-24 at the half before Dunn scored eight points in the third period.
The Geoducks shot just 38 percent (18-for-48) from the field but were an impressive 79 percent (27-for-34) from the foul line, and they had a significant 44-31 rebounding advantage.
Warner Pacific got 13 points and seven rebounds from Darbi Pink and 10 points from Allen.
Evergreen returns to conference action at 5:30 p.m. Saturday when they face the Multnomah Lions.