Eagles lose season opener in Nevada

The Eastern Washington University women's basketball team lost its regular season opener on the road to Nevada 64-49 on Friday after a five-minute scoring drought halted a second half comeback attempt by the Eagles. Nevada improved to 1-0 while Eastern fell to 0-1 on the season.

"Nevada is an extremely athletic, experienced team who you have to be perfect against in terms of your execution and, for 10 minutes, we were not," said Eagles Head Coach Wendy Schuller. "That was the difference."

The Eagles jumped to an early 13-8 lead with 12:46 remaining in the first half. This would be their biggest lead of the game.

"As a whole, we played hard, got on the floor and battled hard against a good team on its home floor. It's discouraging in that it is a loss, but we know we are climbing the ladder and that we have got a lot of rungs in front of us," said Schuller. She said her team has improved greatly from last year.

Eastern's lead was cut to 19-18 at 8:19 before the Wolf Pack went up by as many as nine (32-23) with 2:18 to play in the half. The Eagles closed the gap with a 6-2 run on a pair of threes by Brianne Ryan and Kyla Evans to head into the locker room 34-29.

Three minutes into the second half, the Eagles cut the deficit to 36-34 after another three from Evans and jumper by Julie Piper.

Three minutes later, Evans sank yet another trey to bring Eastern to within two at 42-40. However, this would be the closest EWU would get for the remainder of the game, as Nevada refused to be denied.

"At the 13-minute mark, we just couldn't score, like a lid had been put on the basket," said Schuller, as Eastern went more than five minutes without scoring (13:45-8:11). Nevada took advantage by going on an 8-0 run, extending their lead to 50-40 with 10:59, and eventually to 15 on their way to a win.

Evans had 15 points to lead the Eagles, and shot 5-of-8 from downtown. She also contributed 4 rebounds and two assists. Piper had 13 rebounds, her career high, and 10 points to earn her second career double-double (versus UNC Jan. 17, 2007). Eagle senior Amy Bravtold had seven points, sinking 5-of-6 free throw attempts, and Nicole Scott had a game-high two blocks and five rebounds.

"That's going to be special for us," Schuller said of Eastern's upcoming home opener. "We want to defend our home court and do everything we can to get a 'W' Friday night."

The Eagles will play their home opener next Friday, Nov. 21, versus San Francisco at 7:05 p.m.

The Dons lost their season opener 68-39 against two-time defending national champion and sixth-ranked Tennessee on Saturday, and are set to host the San Francisco Academy of Art Tuesday, Nov. 18 before heading to Cheney.