Junior point guard katie laviolette scored 17 points and dished out nine assists to lead concordia university (16-8, 13-2 nsic) to an 85-56 victory over upper iowa university (8-16, 4-11 nsic) on friday evening at the gangelhoff center. Her 17 points and nine assists were even more impressive as she was able to rest the final 10 minutes of the game with concordia's large lead.

laviolette's nine assists tie her for concordia's single-season school assist record with 207, set by deb harms in 1984-85. At halftime of the men's game, laviolette was presented with a commerative ball to celebrate setting the school's career assist record (division ii era). She now has 423 career assists and is second in the nation in assists per game, entering the evening with an average of 8.61.

the bears trailed by five points early as upper iowa led 9-4 in the first four minutes but a three-pointer by sophomore candace olstad drew the deficit to two points. A pair of free throws by junior center amanda behnke two minutes later would tie the score at 11 and laviolette buried a jumper on the next possessions following a steal to put concordia ahead 13-11.

the peacocks would force a 13-13 tie but two laviolette free throws started an 11-0 run and concordia didn't look back as the lead was never closer than six the rest of the way.

laviolette ended up 6-9 from the floor and 4-5 at the free throw line while contributing three steals and three rebounds. Behnke finished with 15 points, four rebounds and three assists.

c.olstad was the only other bear in double-figures with 11 points while adding four rebounds and two blocks.

kelly lund and kali olstad each scored eight points while mary schroeder and abby nielsen added seven apiece.

in a balanced team rebounding effort, the bears managed to outrebound the peacocks 41-35 despite no one on the team grabbing more than schroeder's six. Lund and whitney smetana each collected five rebounds as well.

concordia, one of the top ten teams in the nation in fewest turnovers, once again took care of the basketball, committing just 11 turnovers and outscoring uiu 17-4 off turnovers.

for the game, the bears shot 79.3% (23-29) at the foul line while limiting the peacocks to just 12 attempts and a 58.3% (7-12) rate. The bears also shot 50.0% (27-54) from the field while holding uiu to 35.9% (23-64).

the golden bears three-point gunners were in full effect once again, hitting 50.0% (8-16) from long range with six players draining at least one trey. Upper iowa, meanwhile, finished just 27.3% (3-11) from long distance.

the bears, who are winners of nine straight and are 14-1 in their past 15, continue their quest for a conference championship tomorrow evening when they host winona state at 6:00.

the warriors are one of the two teams to hand the bears a loss in the northern sun. Earlier this season, wsu defeated cu 66-62 in winona.

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