Box Score ST. GEORGE, Utah — For a long time Friday the 13th looked to be a lucky day for the Dominican University of California women's basketball  team.

The Lady Penguins were giving the Dixie College Red Storm all they could handle in a Pacific West Conference game. Dominican built a first-half lead and was within striking distance of a major upset with eight minutes to play before the host team closed out the game with a 20-4 run to net a 74-54 victory that included a school record 68 rebounds.

“It was a good bounce-back game for us [after 71-29 loss at Grand Canyon Wednesday],” said Dominican Head Coach Brianna Chambers. “We had better effort and execution. We just couldn't keep them off the boards down the stretch.”

Freshman Ariana Flynn scored a career-high 18 points, 12 in the first half, for Dominican (1-14/0-5) while sophomore teammate Natalie Bentz grabbed a career-high seven rebounds. However, the Red Storm (9-4/4-1) had as many offensive rebounds (33) as the Lady Penguins had total rebounds.

Redshirt freshman Lauren Hyatt recorded a game-high three blocked shots, freshman Danielle Yamauchi had a game-high three steals and junior Kimi Nakamura added a team-high three assists for Dominican.

The Lady Penguins, who never led after falling behind 9-0 en route to an 89-59 loss to Dixie State eight days ago in the Conlan Center, amassed a stunning eight-point lead in the first half on the Red Storm's court on Friday. Dominican seized the advantage, 11-10, eight minutes into the game when Flynn netted the first of her four 3-point shots. Te Manu Whakataki "Taki" Te Koi followed with another 3-pointer and the Lady Penguins eventually pushed their lead to 28-20 on another Flynn trey with 2:03 remaining in the first half.

Dominican connected on 50 percent (5-for-10) of its three-point shots in the first against a Dixie State defense that came into the game with the third best defensive 3-point field goal percentage (.325) in the league.

The Dominican defense, meanwhile, made it difficult for Dixie State. The Red Storm missed 21 of their first 26 shots, including nine of 10 3-pointers.  However, they went on a 7-0 run late in the half before Te Koi scored to take the Lady Penguins into the locker room with 30-29 lead.

Te Koi had five points off the bench in the first half while Hyatt, Bentz, and Nakamura had three rebounds apiece.

The Lady Penguins hung in the second half. With a little more than 11 minutes left in the game, Dominican had 22 fewer rebounds (45-23), 21 fewer offensive rebounds (25-4), 21 fewer free throw attempts (33-12) and their two tallest players Hyatt and 6-foot-4 freshman Sarah  Nelson were both on the bench in foul trouble and they were playing without the injured Melissa Wise. Yet, the Lady Penguins were tied at 44-44 following a Nakamura basket.

The Lady Penguins, missed all seven of their 3-point shots in the second half, will be looking to end a 10-game losing streak on Thursday when they play winless Chaminade in a PacWest contest at home. Game time at the Conlan Center is 5:30 p.m. with the men to follow at 7:30 p.m. Both games will be broadcast live online at http://radio.dominican.edu and http://www.dominicanathletics.com/livevideo.