EUGENE, Ore. – The Bushnell women's basketball team held their own in the first quarter, but Southern Oregon University pulled away for a 64-43 Cascade Conference victory on Friday night in the Morse Center.   
 
The Raiders (17-6, 12-3 CCC), currently receiving votes in the NAIA National coaches poll, was one of five schools that came into the day tied for first-place in the CCC, and held their spot thanks to a defense that forced 26 Bushnell turnovers and held the Beacons to just 31% shooting in the game.
 
Bushnell (6-18, 4-12 CCC) was led off the bench by Kyra Quinn, scoring eight points as she shot 3-for-4 from the field with a pair of three-pointers and the Beacons only two successful triples on the night. Ayden Krupke also scored eight for the Beacons while Ellis Mastel scored four points with a team-high six rebounds.
 
"This was a challenging game for us offensively," said Head Coach Chad Meadors. "SOU is so good defensively and I think we did a great job defensively ourselves. We really got after their two top scorers and held them way under their averages. They wore us down in the fourth quarter, but we really had a winning effort tonight. That is how you have to play in order to win in our conference, but now we have to be better with execution and find some answers offensively."


Southern Oregon was led off the bench by Jenika Zurita, scoring 19 points as she shot 5-for-7 from three-point range. Eliza DiGuilio added 11 points and a team-high five rebounds.
 
UP NEXT: The Beacons stay home to face another tie-for-first-place team on Saturday as Oregon Tech comes calling at 3:00 pm.