NEWBERG, Ore. - Keisha Gordon scored a game-high 21 points and the George Fox University Bruins made 20 steals while taking advantage of the Willamette University Bearcats' 29 turnovers en route to a 74-54 win in Northwest Conference women's basketball action Friday night here at the Wheeler Sports Center's Miller Gym.

With its eighth straight win and 15th straight over the Bearcats, George Fox, ranked 7th in the WBCA national poll and 10th in the D3hoops.com poll, improved to 12-2 overall and moved into a tie atop the conference with Lewis & Clark College at 5-0.  Willamette dropped its ninth in a row, falling to 2-13 overall and 0-6 in the league.

Arianna Mohsenian's three-pointer gave George Fox an early 10-5 lead, but Willamette answered with an 8-1 run, capped off by back-to-back threes by Alex Zennan, to take a 13-11 lead seven minutes into the game.  The Bruins tied the game 15-15 and then broke it for good on consecutive layups by Hannah Munger, the last with 8:51 to go in the half.

The Bearcats were still within four at 23-19 after a layup by Kaileigh Westermann with 5:42 left, but the Bruins ripped off 13 uncontested points over the next four minutes to extend the lead to 36-19 and seize control of the game.  Gordon sank two layups and two free throws to spark the rally offensively, while the Bruin defense limited the Bearcats to one shot and forced seven turnovers on six steals, four of them by Samantha Simmons, in that span.  The halftime score was 36-21.

Westermann hit a jumper 20 seconds into the second half to bring the Bearcats within 13 at 36-23, but that was as close as the visitors would get the rest of the game.  The Bruins eventually built a 27-point lead at 62-35 after a pair of MJ Samples free throws with 9:30 remaining, and the margin never got under 20 again. 

Gordon hit 7-11 from the field with a pair of threes and 5-6 free throws for her 21 points in only 17 minutes.  Munger was the only other Bruin in double figures with 14 points.  The George Fox bench contributed 36 points with all eight subs getting into the scoring column, Carrie Myers and Mohsenian leading the way with nine points each.  Simmons had eight rebounds in pacing the Bruins to a 50-35 advantage on the boards and wound up with five steals.  Elise Kuenzi and B.B. Gardner passed out three assists each.

Zennan topped the Bearcats with 16 points, including four three-pointers, and Westermann added 12.  Keilyn Fujioka grabbed a game-high 10 rebounds, and Erin Barclay handed out five assists.  The Bearcats out-shot the Bruins with a .449 shooting percentage (22-49) from the field to the home team's .319 (23-72), but their 29 turnovers to only 15 for George Fox and the Bruins' 25 offensive boards were major factors in a 23-attempt advantage for the Bruins.

NOTES: George Fox hosts Linfield College Saturday at 8:00 p.m. after the men's game at 6:00 p.m. as the NWC continues its weekend experiment of reversing which team plays first ... Willamette is off until next Friday when the Bearcats host Pacific Lutheran University at 6:00 p.m., with the men's conference contest to follow at 8:00 p.m.