HONOLULU, Hawaii — The Dominican University of California women's basketball team saw its playoff hopes extinguished by first-place Hawai'i Pacific on Tuesday evening at the Neal S. Blaisdell Center in a 103-75 loss.

Allyssa Weatherd led the Penguins with 21 points on an 11-of-14 night at the free throw line. Carly Holboke added 19 points on 6-of-9 shooting with five thee pointers. Sarah Nelson added 13 points and nine rebounds. The nation's leading shot blocker turned back a pair of shots.

However, Dominican had little answer for the PacWest's leading scorer, Morganne Comstock. Despite picking up two early fouls, the 6-foot-2 redshirt senior center poured in 34 points and grabbed a dozen rebounds. Combined with 52.6 percent (40-of-76) shooting and a 50-34 rebounding advantage, the Sharks were unstoppable. The 52.6 percent was the highest allowed this season by the Penguins, who entered the contest leading the PacWest limiting opponents to 35.7 percent.

The Sharks, who received votes in the most recent NCAA Division II rankings and own the No. 6 spot in the West Region, jumped out to an 11-point lead in the first nine minutes. Dominican fought back into the game twice, using a 9-0 run to trim the lead to 23-21 with 8:56 to go. However, HPU outscored the Penguins 24-12 to close out the half with a 47-33 lead. Dominican used a 7-0 run in the second half to pull back within nine but the Sharks countered yet again with an 11-point run to take a commanding 66-46 lead with 13 mintues to play.

With the loss, the Penguins can finish no better than 11-9. At 11-8, sixth-place BYU-Hawaii owns the tiebreaker after a 64-61 victory over the Penguins back on Jan. 19. Yet, at 12-12, this year's squad holds the most wins in a season in the Division II era and can still post the program's first winning season — both overall and in PacWest play — in the Division II era.

Dominican continues its three-game road trip on Thursday, Feb. 26 at Chaminade. Tipoff is slated for 7 p.m. Pacific.