Women's Basketball: No. 13 Vikings beat Santa Ana 71-54 in home opener

The No. 13 state-ranked Long Beach City College women's basketball team cruised to a 71-54 win over visiting Santa Ana College in their season opener on Friday night at the Hall of Champions Gym.

The Vikings (1-0) took advantage of 33 Santa Ana turnovers to score 31 points which also led to 27 fast break points.

Freshman guard Shakeena Benton (pictured) led Long Beach with 19 points while sophomore Talia Rayford posted a double-double with 15 points and 12 rebounds.

LBCC trailed Santa Ana 15-12 at the 12:01 mark in the first half before the Vikings put together a 9-0 run to take the lead for good at 21-15. Benton scored seven points over the run, including a three-pointer to lead the Long Beach push. The Vikings went into halftime with a 32-18 lead.

Long Beach put together another run early in the second half, this time an 8-0 streak to take a commanding 41-20 advantage with 17:47 left in the contest.

Freshman Destinn Romain added 10 points for LBCC while sophmore Kaaron King added eight points, four rebounds, and four steals.

Ashley Whisler led Santa Ana (0-2) with 18 points while Berlin Ohanesian posted 10 points and 10 rebounds.

LBCC returns to action on Tuesday (Nov. 13) when it hosts West Los Angeles College in a 6 p.m. non-conference game.