Tigers Dominate in Season Opener

LOS ANGELES, Calif. (Nov. 21, 2008) – With several new pieces in place to start the 2008-09 season, from the newly renovated Rush Gymnasium to a new head coach and uniforms, one thing remained the same, the defending SCIAC champions were still as hungry as ever after winning there first conrence title in 28 years.  With methodical and surgical precision, the Heidi VanDerveer led Tigers, dismantled the visiting Golden Eagles of La Sierra University to open the season with a 62-18 win in the opening game of the Tip Off Classic.

It was a slow start to the game as both team’s struggled to find any type of continuity offensively, but then with a little over three minutes gone, sophomore guard Stephanie Babij picked off an errant pass which fueled a Tiger secondary break, that led to a quick ball reversal from Babij to junior guard Dior Williams who then found a wide open junior guard Brittany Mally in the corner for a wide open three that she buried to get the Tigers on the board.   Mally hit another jumper a few moments later and the Tigers never looked back. Cruising to a 33-6 lead going into halftime.

La Sierra was never able to slow Occidental down, they tried zoning the Tigers in the second half and milking the shot clock to limit the amount of possessions but nothing worked.  Occidental also showed there depth as 14 players saw action tonight with 10 recording at least one point.  Leading the way for the Tigers was Mally with a double-double (12 points & 11 rebounds), but the Tigers were lethal from a variety of positions as sophomore forward Madeline Rose scored nine points to go along with three assists, Babij also had nine points and pulled down seven rebounds, while two others broke double digits in scoring in senior forward Asha Jordan (10 points & six rebounds) and junior guard Gillian Nugent (10 points).  The Golden Eagles were led by Audrey Ramos who led LSU (0-3) with nine points and six rebounds.

Oxy held an edge in several categories, most notably out-rebounding the visitors 54-33, forcing 21 turnovers to 12 for the Tigers, and shooting 37.3% from the field while LSU shot 11.1% on 5-45 shooting from the field.  Plus a trio of freshmen guards saw action in their first collegiate game as a Tiger, Lauren Meyer, Gabriela Hirsh-Gonzalez and Kiana Dobson all made her Tiger debut tonight.

The Tigers (1-0) will be back in action on Saturday, Nov. 22 at 4:00 p.m. when they travel to Caltech to take on UC Santa Cruz, who also was victorious today, defeating the Beavers 50-26 in the second game of the Tip Off Classic.