OSU Women’s Basketball Falls To No. 9 California

The Beavers kept California cold on the outside, limiting the Golden Bears to just one three-pointer made in seven attempts,

Salem-News.com Sports

BERKELEY, Calif. - Mercedes Fox-Griffin scored 10 points to go with five rebounds and five assists and Talisa Rhea scored 16 points but it wasn’t enough as No. 9 California came away with a 61-45 victory over the Oregon State women’s basketball team Saturday afternoon at Haas Pavilion.

Rhea led the Beavers (8-8, 1-4 Pac-10) with four three-pointers, connecting on two in each half. Overall, Rhea was 6-of-11 from the floor. Fox-Griffin, meanwhile, connected on three baskets from the field and knocked down four of her five shots from the free-throw line.

Tiffany Ducker was active on the boards for Oregon State, grabbing nine rebounds, four of which came on the offensive end.

Ashley Allen and Brittney Davis both finished with a three-pointer apiece as Oregon State connected on six during the game. The Beavers kept California cold on the outside, limiting the Golden Bears to just one three-pointer made in seven attempts,

California (15-2, 6-0 Pac 10) was led by Ashley Walker’s 17 points while Devanei Hampton finished the game with 14 points and 12 rebounds. Alexis Gray-Lawson had another 14 points for the Golden Bears.

As a team, the Beavers won the turnover battle, 18-13. Oregon State was also alert on the offensive boards, leading the Bears, 15-10, in that category.

Oregon State pulled closer toward the end of the game, going on a 7-2 run in the last 4:37 to the end of the second half with the help of two more Rhea threes. California, however, had put the game out of reach by that point.

Oregon State returns to legendary Gill Coliseum Thursday when the Beavers host Washington at 7:00 PM Tickets are still available for the game and can be purchased by visiting osubeavers.com, calling 1-800-GOBEAVS or at the Gill Coliseum ticket office.

The game can be heard live by tuning into KLOO 1340-AM in the Corvallis area and KKAD 1550-AM in Portland. It can also be heard live by visiting www.osubeavers.com or Yahoo Sports.

OSU Notes: The game marked the third straight for the Beavers against a ranked opponent … The streak started Jan. 5 when OSU took on No. 24 Arizona State … Then on Thursday, at Maples Pavilion, the Beavers took on Stanford, which was ranked No. 7 by both the Associated Press and ESPN/USA Today … Cal was No. 9 in both polls.

As it stood Saturday, the Beavers were not scheduled to play another top 25 team until Jan. 31 when they face off against Arizona State in Tempe … OSU’s next four games are against Washington and Washington State in Corvallis and USC and UCLA in Los Angeles … Saturday’s game marked a homecoming for nearby Oakland native Alex Mitchell … The freshman graduated from Berkeley High School … The game also marked a matchup of two of the Pac-10’s top-three scorers.

Entering the game, OSU guard Ashley Allen led the conference with 20.5 points per game while California forward Ashley Walker was third at 17.3 … Allen also led the Pac-10 in conference only games with 20.0 points per contest while Walker was eighth at 15.4 … Allen’s teammate, Brittney Davis, came into the game third in Pac-10 only games with 18.5 points per game.

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