Feb. 17, 2005

Box Score

SAN FRANCISCO - The wins keep on coming for the West Coast Conference champion Gonzaga University Bulldogs as they won their nation leading 19th straight game with a 70-62 Thursday night win over the University of San Francisco. Gonzaga improved to 23-2 overall, 12-0 in the WCC while USF dropped to 11-13 overall, 5-6 in the WCC.

Raeanna Jewell led a quartet of Bulldogs into double figures as the senior guard scored 18 points while fellow senior Ashley Burke became the fourth Gonzaga player to score more than 1,500 points for her career adding 17 points to end the night with 1,515. Stephanie Hawk and Anne Bailey rounded the top GU scores with Hawk scoring 10 and Bailey chipping in with 11. This was the ninth straight game that Bailey has reached double figures and her 14th double-digit performance in the last 15 games.

Gonzaga built a 10-point halftime lead going up by as many as 12 points in the first-half when Jewell hit a 3-pointer at the 6:54 mark and again when Burke converted on a lay-up with 3:45 remaining. Jewell scored 12 of her points in the first half while Burke dropped in 10 of her total in the first 20 minutes. Gonzaga led 35-25 at the break.

The Bulldogs continued to keep San Francisco at bay in the second half as the Dons could never close the gap to fewer than eight points. Leeane Jensen hit a 3-pointer at the 7:41 mark to trim the margin to 57-49 and Dominique Carter hit a lay-up with 4:45 remaining to cut the score to 61-53. Each time the Bulldogs had an answer to the Dons run as Shannon Mathews hit a lay-up to end one run and Hawk dropped in a jumper to stop another.

Carter finished with 19 points leading all players despite shooting 9-for-18 from the floor. Jensen added 12 with 10 rebounds while Toni Russell contributed 14. San Francisco finished shooting 41 percent from the floor to become mark only the fourth time in 25 games this season that a team has shot over 40 percent against the Bulldogs. USF also connected on 42 percent against Gonzaga in an 81-62 loss earlier this year at the McCarthey Athletic Center.

Gonzaga converted 15-of-22 free throws for the game including a 5-for-9 effort over the final 3:09 of the game. The five points being the final five GU would score on the night. The Bulldogs travel to the University of San Diego for their final regular-season road game of the year on Saturday afternoon. Game time is 2 p.m. at the Jenny Craig Pavilion.