Box score, play-by-play
        PHOTO GALLERY

SEATTLE – Different night, familiar story: It all starts with defense – and that's what started the Seattle Pacific Falcons on a winning surge.
 
Senior guard Jordan Harazin scored 13 points and handed out five assists, and sophomore forward Katie Benson had a double-double of 12 points and 12 rebounds on Friday as the Falcons pulled away from Cal State East Bay for a 70-59 victory on the first night of the Sodexo Tip-Off Classic women's basketball tournament in Brougham Pavilion.
                     
Junior forward Rachel Murray (Eglington, Australia) added 12 points for the Falcons (2-1). Junior guard Betsy Kingma (Bellevue, Wash./Newport HS) set a career scoring high for the second straight, tallying 10 points – her first double-digit game for SPU. Sophomore guard Aubree Callen also had 10 points. 
 




The Falcons, after building a pair of 10-point leads during the first half, were up just 39-37 on the Pioneers at halftime on Friday, and found themselves down 49-46 with 11:52 left.

But they ran off seven straight points to go permanently in front: a free throw by Harazin (Colfax, Wash./Colfax HS), a technical foul free throw by Callen (Jerome, Idaho), a lay-in by senior forward Joani Reimer (Ferndale, Wash./Lynden Christian HS), and a 3-pointer by Callen.
 
The defense was the key.
 
“They're good at penetrating and they played four guards and one post, so it's hard to defend them because we either have to do a lot of switching or we're going to have mismatches,” Falcons coach Julie Heisey said. “Because we don't do a lot of switching, that definitely hurt us and we got soft on defense.
 
“Second half when we start switching, we were slow and they were still getting to the basket, and I really challenged them ,” Heisey added. “The turning point was Suzanna (Ohlsen) came hard on a jump switch, we forced a bad shot (by East Bay), and you could tell then that we started making a run.”
 
The lead grew to as many as 13 points late in the game.
 
Kingma's previous scoring high was eight points in last Saturday's 56-37 victory against San Francisco State.
 
Cal State East Bay's Lauren Lucchesi led all scorers with 16 points. But she got just one point and only two shots in the second half after going 5 of 8 during the first half – including 3 of 5 from 3-point range. The Pioneers as a whole saw their shooing go way down after halftime. They hit 50 percent (14 of 28) in the first half, but just 28 percent (7 of 25) during the final 20 minutes.
 
Benson (Snohomish, Wash./Snohomish HS) got eight of her points from the foul line, hitting 8 of 9. Led by her 12 rebounds, Seattle Pacific dominated on the boards, 46-29.
 
The Falcons return to the court on Saturday at 5 p.m. against Harding of Searcy, Ark. The Bison were routed by Central Washington in Friday's tournament opener, 88-68. 
 
 
NCAA WOMEN'S BASKETBALL
Sodexo Tip-Off Classic -- Game 2
Friday, Nov. 18, 2011
Brougham Pavilion/Seattle, Wash.
 
SEATTLE PACIFIC 70, CAL STATE EAST BAY 59
 
CAL STATE EAST BAY (1-2)
Lucchesi 5-10 3-4 16; MacMillan 1-3 0-0 2; Blikra 2-5 0-0 4; Bettencourt 2-2 0-0 5; Finlay 4-15 1-2 11; Walker 4-10 1-5 10; Terrance 2-6 1-3 5; Coble 1-2 2-4 4; Bravo 0-0 2-2 2. Totals 21-53 10-20 59.
 
SEATTLE PACIFIC (2-1)
Murray 4-8 3-3 12; Benson 2-12 8-9 12; Harazin 3-7 6-8 13; Gorman 0-6 1-2 1; Callen 3-5 1-2 10; Kingma 4-10 0-0 10; Sims 2-4 0-0 5; Ohlsen 2-3 0-0 4; Reimer 1-1 0-0 2; Stephens 0-1 1-2 1; Thralls 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 21-57 20-26 70.
 
Cal State East Bay.......  37   22  - 59
Seattle Pacific..............  39   31  - 70
 
3-point goals--Cal State East Bay 7-15 (Lucchesi 3-6; Finlay 2-3; Bettencourt 1-1; Walker 1-4; Coble 0-1), Seattle Pacific 8-23 (Callen 3-4; Kingma 2-7; Harazin 1-4; Sims 1-1; Murray 1-3; Gorman 0-2; Ohlsen 0-1; Benson 0-1). Fouled out--Cal State East Bay-None, Seattle Pacific-None. Rebounds--Cal State East Bay 29 (Terrance 10), Seattle Pacific 45 (Benson 11). Assists--Cal State East Bay 8 (Walker 4), Seattle Pacific 16 (Harazin 5). Total fouls--Cal State East Bay 16, Seattle Pacific 17. Technical fouls--Cal State East Bay-TEAM, Seattle Pacific-None.  A-417.
 
Records – Seattle Pacific 2-1, 0-0 GNAC. Cal State East Bay 1-2, 0-0 CCAA.
 
Next game – Harding at Seattle Pacific, Saturday, Brougham Pavilion, 5:00 p.m.