The Cal State Northridge women’s basketball team entered Tuesday night with confidence. The Matadors heads were held high coming off of their best offensive effort all season.
Now, all that’s in their minds is their worst offensive performance in nearly 34 years.
The Matadors (1-8) were defeated by the Fresno State Bulldogs 68-29 Tuesday night at the Save Mart Center in Fresno.
The 29 points is the lowest single-game output since Northridge scored 27 points against UCLA on Feb. 3, 1975. That was the first year of the program’s history.
‘That was just kind of a nightmare,’ said Matador Assistant Coach Abby Vaughan. ‘We just couldn’t execute. We struggled from the start all the way until the end.’
With just over a minute left to play, CSUN was standing at 25 points and staring history in the face. But Freshman Bridgette Conejo sank a runner and then, with just five seconds remaining, senior Tonicia Tademy hit a jumper to keep the Matadors from tying the record.
Northridge scored the game’s first basket, but didn’t put up much of a fight after that. Down by six with eight minutes left in the first half, the Matadors could only muster up a single point the rest of the way and went into halftime down 30-11.
‘We played decent defense in the first half,’ Vaughan said. ‘It kept us in the game somewhat, and we figured our shots would start falling, but they just didn’t.’
The offense picked up slightly in the second half, but the defense was unable to hold the Bulldogs, who improved to 6-2 on the year.
Bailey Amundsen, Jaleesa Ross, and Monique Arnold led Fresno State with 12 points each. Ashley Blake led all Matadors with five points.
Northridge has 10 days off until it travels to Nevada to take part in The Desert Classic in Las Vegas. The Matadors will battle the UNLV Rebel on Dec. 19 and then, depending on the outcome of that game, take on either Southern Mississippi or Oklahoma State the following day.