Students showed off their shooting skills, or lack thereof, while competing in the Big West ShootOut at the Student Activities Center on Thursday. .

The 2008 Big West ShootOut, which is touring all Big West Conference campuses, made a stop at CSUN and gave one co-ed team a shot at the big prize – a chance to win $5,000 in March at the Big West Basketball Tournament in Anaheim.

Brittany Blue and Bobby Moore teamed up as co-eds, the only division eligible for the $5,000 prize, to win an all-expense paid trip to Anaheim to compete against the eight other winning teams from the Big West schools.

“I’m hoping to win the $5,000,” said Blue, an 18-year-old art major. “I’m going to put my all into it.”

Blue and Moore, who met in a gym class at CSUN, scored 21 points against their opponents’ five points to win, said Mike Daniels, assistant commissioner of the Big West Conference. They will compete again on March 13, the second night of the Big West Basketball Tournament, at half time of the men’s basketball games at 6 p.m. and 8:30 p.m. at the Anaheim Convention Center Arena. They will get three nights in a hotel, along with tickets to the games.

Thirty-one teams of two competitors from CSUN registered in three different divisions – men’s, women’s and co-ed’s. Each team had 30 seconds to gain points by shooting from six marked spots on the court. The harder the shots, the more points they were worth. A shot from behind the three-point line was worth six points, with point values decreasing as the shots get closer to the basket.

Teams had to alternate shots ?and could not stand on the same spot two consecutive times. Trying for the long, high-scoring shots backfired on some of the teams, resulting in long rebounds, taking too much time to get the next shot off.

“It was a good competition,” Daniels said “We’ve actually been really happy (with the tournament).”

The winners of the men’s division – Rudy Marroquin and Chun Wai Yip – and the women’s division – Brittany Turner and Patriece Thornton – each received prize packs with restaurant gift certificates and other merchandise.

Brothers Adrian and John Buencamino, both business majors, had the hot hands early on, but could not keep up the pace to win the men’s championship.

“We could have done a lot better,” said 21-year-old John Buencamino, even after they just had advanced to the next round.

On the women’s side, Turner and Thornton were happy with the win, especially since they were just walking by the registration table outside the Matadome when they spontaneously decided to sign up. Still, they admitted they were nervous at first.

“I didn’t think we had the highest score,” said Turner, a 19-year-old biology major.

This is the first year of the Big West ShootOut, and it gives great exposure to the conference, said Daniels.

The idea for the competition came from the Atlantic 10 Conference, which started it six years ago and averaged 15 teams in its first year, said Daniels. The Big West has averaged 47 teams in its first year after visiting four campuses, with University of California, Davis registering 69 teams, the most so far. UC Irvine signed up 62, and Pacific had 27.

The next stop for the Big West ShootOut will be today at UC Riverside.