Senior transfer Christine Martin is averaging 8.5 points per game in 2011-12 after starting in only four games. She also shoots 34 percent from beyond the arc. -Nha Ha, Mustang Daily
The women’s basketball team was denied a perfect 4-0 start to Big West play on Sunday afternoon as UC Irvine outlasted the Mustangs in a 62-60 win.
The loss drops the Mustangs, a pre-season favorite to win the conference, to 6-10 on the year and 3-1 in the Big West. The Mustangs trailed by two after the Anteaters hit a pair of free-throws with 19 seconds to go.
The team put the ball in the hands of former Big West Player of the Year Kristina Santiago who drew a foul, but was only able to convert one of the two free throws. A turnover on the Mustangs’ final possession with four seconds to go cemented their fate.

Kristina Santiago led all scorers with 21 points. She averages more than 23 points per game while her closest competitor in the Big West averages 16.8. Santiago also leads the league in rebounding (10.4 per game) and field goal percentage (.561).

Ashlee Burns was the only other Mustang to earn double-figures on Sunday. She scored 12 points off four 3-pointers. She has shot 35 percent from behind the arc while starting all 16 games this season, and she was 4-of-10 from 3-point range on Sunday.

Abby Bloetscher, playing in only her second game this season due to injury, played four minutes off the bench.

The team won its first matchup of the weekend, a 71-43 manhandling of UC Riverside, which only had eight players available. Santiago broke a 25-year-old school record as she picked up her 693rd career rebound midway through the first half. She had nine in the game coupled with a game-high 24 points.

Fourteen Mustangs took the court on Friday as 10 players scored, including redshirt freshman Ariana Elegado, who tallied 11 points off the bench. The team attempted 78 field goals, converting 31 (39.7 percent) while limiting Riverside to 59 attempts, but the Highlanders only made 17 buckets (28.8 percent).

The team travels to Southern California this weekend for games against Big West leader Cal State Northridge and Long Beach State before coming home on Jan. 26 to play Pacific. The Mustangs sit in second place in the Big West, the final conference standings determine the seeding for the conference tournament in March.

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