Colorado University Athletics
Colorado
13-2, 3-1Big 12
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Kansas
7-8, 0-4Big 12
Buffs Blow By Jayhawks, 71-50
January 18, 2003 | Women's Basketball
LAWRENCE, Kan. - Kate Fagan had as close a mirror image to a previous game as a player could have.
Fagan made six three pointers and finished with 22 points and had seven rebounds, all three either tying or setting career highs, and Tera Bjorklund had 12 points and eight rebounds to lead Colorado past Kansas 71-50 to help the Buffs to their best start in Big 12 history. Just 19 days ago on New Year's Eve, Fagan performed almost the exact same feat finishing with 22 points and making six three pointers while grabbing six boards against Syracuse in her homestate of New York. Only this time she was 6-8 from three-point territory instead of 6-17.
Amber Metoyer had 11 points coming off the bench and Linda Lappe only scored eight points, but dished out 10 assists.
"Kate Fagan played a great game," said Colorado coach Ceal Barry. "She hit timely 3's and played great defense."
Kansas (7-8, 0-4 Big 12) took an early 6-0 lead in the first 2:43 of the game off a pair of Tamara Ransburg jumpers and a layup by Blair Waltz. Colorado (13-2, 3-1) climbed back to tie the game at eight apiece with 13:56 remaining in the half by a lay in from Bjorklund, who returned to her pre-Big 12 form after scoring six points in three straight conference games. Linda Lappe's two free throws a minute later put Colorado up for good, after she made her first two shots. The Buffaloes took the biggest lead of the half when Amber Metoyer hit a 10-foot jumper to put her team up 33-19. Metoyer built Colorado's lead by hitting three straight shots in the last 1:48 of the half en route to helping her team shoot 61 percent from the field for the half-a huge turnaround from last Saturday's record setting low of 17.2 percent in the first half against Kansas State.
Fagan prevented Kansas from making a strong comeback, like they did last week against Oklahoma State, at the start of the second half by hitting four consecutive three pointers in less than four minutes. The Jayhawks came back from a 20 point deficit on Wednesday night before falling to the Cowgirls 60-56. Kansas cut Colorado's lead to 11 points, 35-24, with 19:28 left in the game but only managed to hit five field goals in the last 11:09
Colorado shot 58 percent from the floor, compared to Kansas' 36 percent, and outrebounded their opponent 37-28. Ransburg led the way for Kansas as she was the only Jawhawk to score in double figure scoring getting 13 points and collecting nine rebounds.
Bjorklund is now 36 points away from hitting the 1,000 point plateau. She will be only the sixth junior to hit that mark. If she scores at least her average, she will have the opportunity to get to 1,000 against Texas Tech next Saturday in Boulder on Fox Sports Net.
Colorado will be back on the road Wednesday as the Buffaloes will head to Stillwater, Okla., to go up against Oklahoma State (5-10, 1-3 Big 12), a 95-45 loser to Texas Tech on Saturday, at 6 p.m. The Cowgirls are lead by their center Trisha Skibbe who is averaging 16.4 ppg and 6.7 rpg.
