Box Score vs. UC Riverside
RIVERSIDE, Calif. – The University of Pennsylvania (6-4) tallied the second win of their Southern California road trip with a 71-55 victory over UC Riverside (6-7) on Monday evening in Riverside, Calif.
The Quakers put up their best three-point shooting performance of the season and matched their highest trey output in the Mike McLaughlin era with 12 made field goals from beyond the arc, making 12-of-26 attempts at a 46.2% clip for the contest.
Phoebe Sterba led the Red and Blue with a season-high 15 points, making 5-of-6 attempts from three-point range. Beth Brzozowski, Princess Aghayere and Sydney Stipanovich each provided double-digit efforts for the Quakers and Stipanovich tallied her sixth double-double of the season and the 34th of her career with 10 points and 12 rebounds.
Riverside was led by Malou De Kergret's 16 points while Rejane Verin and Skyler Lewis provided 12 and 14 points, respectively.
With tonight's win, the Quakers improved to 6-4 on the season prior to the start of Ivy League play set to begin next Saturday.
HOW IT HAPPENED
The Quakers started out on a 5-0 run courtesy of a Lauren Whitlatch's jumper and trey, but the Highlanders matched that effort scoring the next seven points to take a 7-5 lead. Phoebe Sterba, Beth Brzozowski and Whitlatch had the hot hands for the Red and Blue as Penn went on to score 15 of their 23 points from beyond the arc in the stanza, including a 5-of-11 (45.5%) effort to close the quarter with a 23-16 advantage over the hosts.
UCR began to cut into the Penn lead in the second, with Rejane Verin – coming into the contest as the Highlander's leading scorer - notching six points in the frame to make it a 26-22 contest following the media timeout. Ashley Russell broke a 4-0 Riverside run connecting from downtown, and the Quakers took an eight-point lead into intermission, 36-28.
The Quakers opened the second half much the same as they started following a Kasey Chambers trey, but the Highlanders continued to work inside the paint to keep the Penn lead within single digits. Sterba and Brzozowski paired up to continue the Red and Blue barrage from beyond the arc as the Red and Blue went 4-of-6 from 3-point range (66.7%) in the quarter to take a 55-46 lead into the final 10 minutes of action.
An 11-5 run over the first four minutes of the fourth sealed the win for the Quakers, and Penn put up an 18-point lead - their largest of the contest – with three minutes to play following a Aghayere jumper to make it a 71-53 advantage. Aghayere put up eight points in the final 10 minutes of action as the Quakers sealed the win over Riverside, 71-55.
UP NEXT
The Quakers return to action for the start of Ivy play when they travel to archrival Princeton on Saturday, Jan. 7. Game time is slated for 4 p.m. in Jadwin Gym and will be followed by the Quaker vs. Princeton at 7 p.m.
NOTES
UC Riverside was without their third leading scorer in Lauren Hall, who was averaging 11.6ppg and 3.4rpg… UCR came into tonight's contest at No. 112 in the RPI standings – the highest ranked opponent since Penn met Duke (No. 23) in the season-opener… Penn's 12 three-pointers matches the highest in the Mike McLaughlin era, last met in the 2014 season against Yale.
