No. 13 Gonzaga women cruise to 93-62 win over Portland

PORTLAND – Zykera Rice had 14 points and Laura Stockton scored 13 to help No. 13 Gonzaga beat Portland 93-62 Saturday night and extend its win streak to six games.

Jill Townsend added 12 points while Katie Campbell and Louise Forsyth each scored 11 points for Gonzaga. The Bulldogs (22-2, 11-1 West Coast Conference) shot a season-high 60.3 percent from the field, including 20 of 29 (71.4 percent) in the second half.

“We had a really efficient offensive attack tonight,” Gonzaga coach Lisa Fortier said in a team release. “We have so many offensive threats, and when we are sharing the ball and looking for teammates, we are hard to stop.”

Julie Spencer hit a jumper to give the Pilots (10-13, 2-10) a 10-4 lead. But the Pilots missed their next nine shots and scored one point over the next 9 minutes, 40 seconds as Gonzaga used a 19-1 run to make it 23-11 early in the second quarter.

Maddie Muhlheim hit a 3-pointer that trimmed Portland’s deficit to nine points with 3:13 left in the first half, but Rice answered with a jumper to spark a 10-2 run that made it 40-23 at the break and GU led by at least 14 the rest of the way.

“I loved the defensive effort for most of the game tonight,” Fortier said. “We were flying around and forcing turnovers.”

Haylee Andrews led Portland with 17 points, and Muhlheim scored 13.

Jessie Loera had a career-high 10 of Gonzaga’s 25 assists on 35 baskets. Ten Bulldogs scored two points or more and nine had at least one assist.

Gonzaga is back in action on Thursday against visiting San Diego at 6 p.m. in the McCarthey Athletic Center.