This week, it’s “make and hope for a break.” The Aggies can make an opportunity for themselves by hanging a 4th loss on front running UC Irvine this Saturday, but to have that make a real difference, they need to catch a break by UC San Diego losing to either Fullerton or Santa Barbara. However, none of that matters of the Ags don’t take care of business on Thursday evening against Long Beach. Despite sitting next to last in the conference both offensively and defensively, the Beach held a 4-point halftime lead over Davis two weeks ago in SoCal. Only a strong 3rd quarter allowed Davis to pull out a tough 10-point win. The scouting report on Davis is that physicality and aggression take the Aggies out of their game, so UCD should expect that this week from the Beach and the Anteaters, as well as next week in the Big west tournament.

Last week’s Big West Player of the Week and #3 scorer in the conference, Jaquoia Jones-Brown leads the Beach in scoring (17.8 ppg) and rebounding (6.9 rpg). Khylee Pepe contributes 9.1 points a game as well. Rosie Akot and Pepe both add 5 boards a contest. Defensively, the Roadrunners allow 73 points a contest, while only scoring 57.

As we enter the last week of regular season play, UCD has four players averaging double figures: Ryann Bennett (15.6), Nya Epps (12.6), Megan Norris (12.2) and Avery Sussex (11.4). Norris also leads the Aggies - and the Big west - in rebounding at 13.0 rpg, followed by Epps and Tegan Young, each collecting 4 boards a game. UCD averages 69 ppg, while conceding 64. A win on Thursday keeps their hopes for a share of the Big West regular season title alive for at least one more game. At the very least, it cements a top-3 finish ahead of either Fullerton or a surging University of Hawaii.