Lopes rise, fall in Powell's debut

Friday, November 10

Phoenix, Ariz.

2 P.M.

Grand Canyon

0-1

Rice

1-0

Rice

Grand Canyon

11/10/2017 5:28:00 PM | Women's Basketball, Paul Coro

Box Score

GCU leads Rice by 15 at halftime, loses 69-59

By: <a href="http://gculopes.com/index.aspx?path=coro">Paul Coro</a>

The buzzer sounded as senior guard August Touchard's 3-point shot fell through the net.

The Grand Canyon women's basketball team had outplayed Rice by 15 points and raced off the GCU Arena court in jubilation on their head coach's debut afternoon.

If only that had been the final buzzer of Lopes head coach Nicole Powell's first game at the helm of a program. Her Lopes stunned Rice with a 33-18 lead at halftime Friday but surrendered a 35-point third quarter on the way to a 69-59 season-opening loss.

While playing small lineups that even had 5-foot-11 guard Jessica Gajewski in the middle, GCU rode Brie Mobley's and Gajewski's offense to end the half on a 9-0 run and keep Rice to 32 percent shooting.

This was a young, small GCU team with six returning players dominating a Rice squad that won 22 games last season and was the 2017 Women's Basketball Invitational champion.

"I really didn't think we played that well," Powell said of the first half. "Brie carried us. She really carried the load. We still didn't play the way we wanted to. We were in foul trouble. We didn't have our starters in so I thought we could've done a lot better. It was good that we were up in that situation but we're capable of playing better basketball."

The Lopes could not stop Rice's third-quarter offensive momentum. The Owls often drove to the rim but hit tough 3-pointers whne GCU's defense was worthy of a stop.

"We played hard and gave effort," said Mobley, who led the Lopes in points (23), rebounds (eight) and steals (three). "Obviously, our defense was lacking in the third quarter but I thought we played hard overall, which is a good thing for us in the first game."

Mobley and Gajewski scored GCU's first 30 points of the game until Touchard ended the half with the first of her four 3-pointers. Starter Vanessa Murphy was the team's only other scorer with three points.

The Lopes could not do without Mobley, Gajewski and Touchard, each of whom played the entire game. Mobley scored with an offensive array of mid-range jumpers off pull-up and jab-step moves, drives to the lane and hustle plays. Gajewski brought an offensive mix too, making three 3-pointers and scoring off runners and slashes.

"Our team really fought and that's what I'm really proud of," Powell said. "We had some great performances. Just sheer effort with kids playing 40 minutes. That's tough to do. The third quarter killed us. Anybody could see that. It really hurt us and it was a struggle to get back in the game. After a third quarter like that, to lose by 10 was a positive."

Powell has a roster with nine new players but is leaning on a starting lineup of returning players with transfers Jordan Jackson and Kavita Akula and freshman Myra Williams coming off the bench.

"I think Nicole is doing a tremendous job," Rice coach Tina Langley said. "She was a great player and she's a great coach. I know she's going to have a lot of success here."

After the 2 p.m. game, Powell told her team that they could go through their emotions and re-evaluate their play until 6 p.m. From there, the Lopes needed to turn the page to Sunday, when 12^th-ranked Duke visits to play against GCU at 2 p.m.

"We're disappointed but we're going to learn, grow and get better," Powell said. "We care about how we're playing in February and March a whole lot more than how we're playing in November. We have a big challenge ahead of us and they're going to embrace the moment."

Follow Paul Coro on Twitter: @paulcoro.