ThunderWolves welcome back Massari in style

CSU-Pueblo 91, New Mexico Highlands 48 

By Ryan Kaufman

There is nothing like re-opening your home court with a 43-point victory. That is what the Thunderwolves did to break in the newly-renovated Massari Arena. CSU-Pueblo stomped the Cowgirls of New Mexico Highlands 91-48 on Friday night.

Point guard Kaylon Miller scored the first bucket in the new-ish gym with a jumper 1:58 into the game. That sparked a mini 6-0 run by the Thunderwolves to open the game. The Cowgirls answered back with a 7-0 run of their own, but that was when the Thunderwolves turned on the gas and left New Mexico Highlands in the dust.

The home team scored 18 unanswered points during one stretch in the first half. The Cowgirls played hard in the last few minutes of the half to close the halftime deficit to 20.

Seemingly the only thing the Thunderwolves did not do well in the first half was shoot three-pointers. CSU-P jacked up 20 treys, but only hit four of them. Head Coach Kip Drown did not lose faith.

"We don't say too much to our shooters," Drown said. "We trust them and we believe they can knock them down."

Coach Drown's shooters did not betray his confidence. The Thunderwolves hit 8 of their 15 shots from deep in the second half. The big story of the second half and the entire game really was the rebounding. The home team pulled down 58 boards, which is the most the ladies' program has notched in a game since March of 2004 against Fort Lewis.

"I was most impressed with our offensive rebounding," Coach Drown said. "That's something that we have gotten better at as the season has gone on."

The Thunderwolves out-rebounded the Cowgirls by 22 and outscored them by 43, so you know there were some outstanding individual performances. Lindsay Black led the Thunderwolves in scoring with 20 points to go along with 10 rebounds and Sarah Staggs led the team in rebounding with 11 boards to go along with her 12 points. The last time the Thunderwolves had two players with double-doubles in the same game was in 2005 when Lauren Westerman and Stacey Nutt achieved that feat against Adams State.

After the 91-48 victory, Coach Drown described the mood of his team prior to this historic game.

"I was in the locker room before the game and you could hear the crowd really getting into it 25 minutes before the game," Drown said. "Our kids were really excited."

The Lady Thunderwolves unfortunately will only get one more game at Massari Arena this season before heading into the RMAC Tournament. That final game is Saturday night at 6 p.m. against Western New Mexico.