Tulsa Cruises to 87-37 Win over UAPB

Tuesday, December 5

Reynolds Center

7:00 pm

Tulsa

4-5

Arkansas - Pine Bluff

2-5

Arkansas-Pine Bluff

Tulsa

Tulsa Cruises to 87-37 Win over UAPB

12/5/2017 9:45:00 PM | Women's Basketball

Box Score

Final Stats in PDF
Final Stats in HTML
Season Stats in PDF

Crystal Polk led five double-figure scorers with a game-best and career-high 16 points as Tulsa posted an 87-37 win over the Arkansas-Pine Bluff Lions Tuesday night at the Donald W. Reynolds Center.

Polk converted 6-of-10 from the field and 4-of-7 from the free throw line, and grabbed 10 rebounds for her second double-double of the season in 22 minutes.

Four more Tulsa players tallied double-figure points as Alexis Gaulden was 5-of-6 from three-point range for 15 points, while Erika Wakefield scored 12, Morgan Brady tallied 12 and Tatyana Perez had 11 points.

Brady, who came to Tulsa as a walk-on athlete, was awarded a scholarship following the game as the Hurricane celebrated the victory. The 12 points was Brady's first double-digit scoring game and doubles her previous season total of six points.

"We needed a game like this," said Tulsa head coach Matilda Mossman. "It will go so far in helping prepare us for the Arkansas game on Sunday. It's one thing to beat a team, but another to beat them handedly."

The 50-point win was the largest for the Golden Hurricane since a 62-point victory against Langston in January 2013, and it was the third largest win margin in school history. Tulsa led by as many as 52 points before the Lions final basket.

"One thing we were trying to impress on our team is to extend our lead each quarter and we did that. We just kept extending the points we were scoring over them each quarter, and as a result we got five players in double figures, and Crystal gets a double-double. It was good to see so many kids contribute like that," added Mossman.

Tulsa came out after intermission and scored the first six points to expand its lead to 23 points, 44-21, with 2:20 gone in the second half, and proceeded to outscore the Lions in the period by a total of 26-10 for a 64-31 lead heading into the final quarter.

The Lions went scoreless from the field for a 14-minute stretch over the second and third quarters, as Tulsa went on a 33-7 run during that span for a 53-25 lead. In the fourth quarter, the Hurricane outscored the Lions 23-6, and in the entire second-half had a 49-to-16 scoring advantage.

For the game, the Hurricane scored 31 points off of 22 UAPB turnovers, had a 19-6 edge in second-chance points and the Tulsa reserves outscored the Pine Bluff bench 44-to-14. Tulsa also held a 47-to-33 edge in rebounding.

After going scoreless in the first 2:07 of the game, the Hurricane went on a 7-0 run before the Lions scored their first points at the 6:14 mark of the first quarter. Tulsa closed out the first quarter on a 5-0 run to take a 20-12 lead after one period.

Polk led the way for Tulsa with seven points and three rebounds in the first quarter, as the Hurricane shot 46-percent from the field and made one of its two three-pointers.

UAPB scored the first six points of the second period, cutting the Hurricane lead to 20-18 with 7:11 left on the clock. Tulsa began the second quarter going scoreless for the first 3:11, but then went on a 10-0 run for a 30-18 lead at the 2:55 mark. The Hurricane finished the first half scoring 18 points in the final 6:49 for a 38-21 halftime lead.

Polk ended the first half already with a new career-high of 14 points and added a team-high five rebounds in 16 minutes of action.

Tulsa shot 41-percent from the field in the first 20 minutes and held a 24-16 lead on the boards, while holding the Lions to just 28-percent shooting.