West Ties School Record in Tartans 84-77 Victory at Chicago

(CHICAGO, Ill.) - The Carnegie Mellon University women's basketball team traveled to Chicago, Ill., Friday, February 21 to play the Maroons of the University of Chicago in a University Athletic Association (UAA) contest. Junior Gabrielle West (Cincinnati, Ohio/Mount Notre Dame) tied her own single-game record of seven three-pointers made in an 84-77 Tartan victory. The win improves the Tartans record to 12-11, 3-9 while the Maroons are now 14-9, 8-4.
 
The first half saw six lead changes with the last coming by way of West.  She connected on back-to-back three-pointers with four minutes left in the half to give Carnegie Mellon a 29-28 lead.

Two minutes later, West once again connected back-to-back long balls surrounding between a Chicago layup which made the score 38-32.  West then closed the half draining her fifth three-pointer with two seconds remaining to give the Tartans a 41-37 edge at the break.  The junior led all scorers after twenty minutes of action with 15 points on 5-of-6 shooting from behind the arc.

Carnegie Mellon opened the second half on a 15-6 run over the first 6:42 to grab a 56-43 lead.  Once again it was West connecting on a pair of treys to give the Tartans their largest lead of the game.

The Maroons did not go away, using an 11-2 run to climb back into the game.  Carnegie Mellon then scored nine straight points to push its lead back to double digits at 67-54 with nine minutes remaining.  Chicago answered with three straight from behind the arc to cut the lead to 67-63 with 7:51 showing on the clock.

With the Tartans leading 73-65 with 4:17 to play, Chicago went on a 10-2 run to knot the score at 75-75 with 2:11 to go.  The Maroons Britt Nordstrom ended the run with a traditional three-point play.

Freshman Lisa Murphy (McLean, Va./McLean) gave the Tartans a 79-77 advantage on a layup with 37 seconds left.  Following a turnover, sophomore Liza Otto (Glastonbury, Conn.) was fouled and sent to the charity stripe where she converted both shots to extend the Tartans lead to 81-77 with 25 seconds on the clock.  Senior Jacquie Shaw (Portland, Ore./Grant) added a free throw and Otto two more for a final score of 84-77.

Carnegie Mellon ended the game shooting 56.9% from the floor, the highest of the season, while Chicago shot 45.9%.

West led the Tartans with 23 points and finished shooting 7-of-12 from behind the arc.  Shaw, Murphy and Otto all finished with double figures.  Shaw had 19 points, Murphy 18 and Otto 13.  Murphy recorded a career-best six blocks in the win while Otto dished out a game-high six assists.

West moved into second place on the school's all-time three-pointers made list.  She now has 153 for her career and needs 23 to move into first.

Chicago was led by Paige Womack with 21 points.  Nordstrom finished with 13 while Julie Muguira had 10.

Carnegie Mellon will head to St. Louis on Sunday, February 23 to the fifth-ranked Bears of Washington University.  Tip is set for 2:00 p.m. CT.