PUEBLO, Colo. (GoThunderWolves.com – Mar. 1, 2014) — A balanced offensive attack and a stellar defensive effort allowed the Colorado State University-Pueblo women's basketball team to end the regular season with a convincing 68-53 Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference and Senior Night win over visiting Regis University, Saturday night here in Massari Arena.
The Pack, who honored their four seniors prior to the game, held the Rangers to just one 3-pointer on 18 attempts (5.6 percent) and to just 29.8 percent (17-57) floor shooting overall, en-route to a 35-19 halftime lead and the eventual 15-point win. With the victory, the ThunderWolves improved to 21-7 overall and to 18-4 in RMAC play while Regis fell to 15-11 overall and to 13-9 in the loop.
The ThunderWolves will be the No. 2 seed in next weekend's RMAC Shootout and will host Metro State (13-13, 12-10 RMAC) for the second time in five days during the quarterfinal round on Tuesday evening at 7 p.m. Saturday's win was also important from a regional standpoint as the Pack entered the week ranked fourth in the NCAA Division II South Central Regional Rankings before a set-back on Friday night to Metro State.
Regis was ranked 10th in the region.
Although it was the defense that led to the win, the ThunderWolves did have plenty of offense and were led by 18 points from Taylor Fox (Santa Cruz, Calif.) and Alex Evans (Louisville, Colo.), two of CSU-Pueblo's seniors. The other two — Paige Ramm (Prescott, Ariz.) and Jenay Locke (Gilbert, Ariz.) combined for 11 points as Locke dished out five assists to join Evans and junior Katie Nehf (Broomfield, Colo.), who had 12 points, seven boards and four steals as well.
Fox, who was 7-for-14 from the floor, also added a game-high 10 rebounds to tally her sixth double-double of the campaign.
Evans was 5-for-11 from the floor while hitting on all three of her 3-point attempts and all five of her charity stripe attempts.
Regis, who will go to next weekend's RMAC Shootout as the No. 4 seed was led by 14 points from Taelor Purdy and another 12 from Kaycee Hert.
After taking a 2-0 lead on their opening shot, the Rangers went without a bucket for eight possessions over more than five minutes as the Pack went on a 13-0 run to build a double-figure lead. CSU-Pueblo then extended the lead to 20 with another 16-3 run and never looked back en-route to the victory.
