The Gustavus women’s basketball team defeated Augsburg 67-57 in the Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference opener for both squads on Wednesday in Minneapolis in a contest that featured 50 fouls. The Gusties, ranked 12th in the nation, improved to 2-0 on the year while the Auggies fell to 0-4.
Angie Peterson, who fouled out with 2:30 left on the clock, led a balanced Gustavus scoring attack with 15 points. With the 15 points, Peterson went over 1,000 points scored in her collegiate career. She scored 113 points in 2000-01 while playing for St. Thomas, 403 in 2001-02 in her first year in a Gustavus uniform, 458 points her junior season, and 37 points so far this season for a total of 1,011. The Gusties had seven players score at least six points in the come-from-behind victory.
Augsburg, winners of just four games last season, rallied from a 12-point first-half deficit to cut the Gustie lead to 28-25 at the break. Augsburg held the lead on three separate occasions in the second half before the Gusties pulled away in the final six minutes for the win.
Trailing 51-50 with just over six minutes remaining, Gustavus went on a 17-6 run to close out the game. Over that span, the Gusties shot four-of-six from the field while Augsburg was one-of-four and committed six turnovers.
Kristin Kachelmyer netted 11 points and grabbed a team-high eight rebounds while Lacy Skoog added 10 points for Gustavus. Augsburg was paced by Selina Theisen who registered a double-double with 15 points and 12 rebounds.
Much of the game was played out at the free throw line, as Augsburg was 22-of-30 (73%) and Gustavus was 14-of-24 (58%) from the charity stripe. The Auggies had six different players commit at least three fouls while the Gusties had five players whistled for at least three fouls.
Augsburg was haunted by 30 turnovers. Gustavus scored 32 points off of those miscues. Kachelmyer and Peterson had six and four steals respectively for Gustavus. The Gusties turned the ball over 17 times.
Gustavus continues MIAC play on Saturday by hosting Concordia. Augsburg will host Carleton on Saturday. Both games will begin at 1:00 pm.