LEOPARD DIARY: WOMEN'S HOOPS IN LAS VEGAS

In a three-part series, University of La Verne women's basketball seniors Christina Kinney and Michelle Webb provide an inside look into the Leopards' trip to Las Vegas as they compete in the D3hoops.com Classic.

PART III

After a tough loss on Friday against Coe, we were back at it again early on Saturday and ready to play and determined to get a victory while in Las Vegas!

We woke up early and had something little to eat because our game against Lake Forest was at 10 am. We got to South Point Arena and stretched and talked about our defense. Our energy was great and we knew we were ready. Against Lake Forest, we didn't have a good start but we eventually went into halftime with a three-point lead.  We kept executing and started to click in the second half, getting some steals and easy buckets to give us a comfortable lead midway through. We won 102-92, and we made each of our 21 free throw attempts.

After the game we relaxed for a bit and then we were headed to The Strip.  We walked all along The Strip as long as we could stopping at shops such as "Urban Outfitters" and "Starbucks" because it was a bit cold outside. We had some funny interactions with some of the people that dress up in Vegas.  For example, one of our teammates put a dollar in this guy's bucket that had painted himself gold and he started dancing on her.   It was pretty funny moment!  When we met my other teammates, we made them put another dollar because they had no idea he was about to dance with them, and we recorded it.

For all the people that haven't been to Las Vegas, like our out of state girls it was a really good experience. We then headed back to the hotel and rested for about an hour and then went bowling with most of the team, as well as the coaches. We had three separate lanes and our top bowlers were Amanda Copas, and Alison Takagaki.  After a long day where we were up since 7:30 am,  we went back to our rooms around 10:00 pm and some of us watched the movie Gladiator while others had a Phase 10 tournament.  We fell asleep shortly after due to the fact that we knew we have to be on the road at 7:30 am Sunday morning.  It felt good to end the D3hoops.com Classic with a victory and we all enjoyed our experience in Las Vegas.

It’s now it's time to get back to Southern California and get ready for our two conference games this week.  We play Caltech on the road Thursday and host Chapman on Saturday.  Happy New Year and Go Leopards!