MALIBU, Calif. – Amy Patton made her collegiate debut for Northern Arizona women's basketball matching a game-high 16 points in the Lumberjacks 96-67 loss to Pepperdine on Friday at the Firestone Fieldhouse. Patton, a freshman from Tempe, Ariz., shot 6-of-14 from the field and pulled down a team-high seven rebounds.

“Going into the game I thought rebounding and taking care of the ball would be the two most important things and hands down that was the truth,” said head coach Laurie Kelly. We turned the ball over unnecessarily and we put them at the line too many times to win that basketball game.”

NAU (0-1) totaled 35 turnovers compared to Pepperdine's (1-0) 20 and the Lumberjacks were out-rebounded on the offensive end 20-9 and 47-39 for the game.

“Pepperdine presses, runs and jumps for 40 minutes,” Kelly said. “We scored 67 points against a very good defensive team. I saw a lot of good things but at the same time we are not going to win games giving up 96 points. Two things that really killed us were turnovers and fouls.”

The Lumberjacks put Pepperdine on the free-throw line 48 times and the Waves converted 35 of those attempts. Pepperdine prevented NAU from finding any offensive rhythm playing a full-court game and pressing the ball which led to Lumberjack turnovers and uncontested fast break points for the Waves.

“We never controlled the tempo of the game and it was difficult to go on runs with the game being broken up by so many fouls,” Kelly said. We bailed them out too many times with bad fouls and put them on the free-throw line where they scored 35 points.

Although the score was skewed it was a lot closer than that. We made a run and cut the lead to four but we let them go on big runs. We didn't do a good jump of trying to cut those runs. We turned the ball over so many times they were able to get easy shots. Their defense really triggered their offense.”

Patton scored 14 of her 16 points in the first half and would have added to her total but was one of two Lumberjacks and four players in the game to foul out. In all, NAU and Pepperdine combined for 63 fouls and 55 turnovers, which can be expected of two teams in their season openers.

The Lumberjacks narrowly out-shot Pepperdine hitting 40.7-percent for the game compared to the Waves' 40.6-percent. NAU made six three-point attempts, one more than Pepperdine, but the Waves totaled 18 more points at the free-throw line.

In addition to Patton's noteworthy performance, sophomore Caty Huntington scored 13 points and junior Tiffany Amos added 12 points off the bench. Pepperdine, who had four players in double figures, was led by Miranda Ayim's 16 points.

"We are going to take some growing pains with this much youth," Kelly said. "I was really happy with the play of the young players. We nearly had four players in double figures which is a good sign. We are going to need some depth scoring wise. Pepperdine is a team that is so different than what we normally face in the Big Sky. With a young team, that magnifies the mistakes.”

The Lumberjacks will play at UC Riverside on Sunday, November 15 at 3 p.m. and look to build upon their 3-1 all-time record against the Highlanders.