EAU CLAIRE, Wis. - The eighth-ranked UW-Eau Claire women's basketball team pushed its win streak to eight games with a 59-47 victory over UW-Platteville tonight at Zorn Arena.

The Blugolds are now 8-0 on the season and 2-0 in Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference play, while Platteville drops to 3-5 overall and 1-1 in the conference.

Platteville was held scoreless for almost the first three minutes of the game while Eau Claire scored nine points. But the Blugolds had a drought of their own right after that, not scoring for more than six minutes. While the Blugolds led the entire game, they could not pull away in the first half and never got up by more than seven the rest of the half after their initial run to open the game. Platteville closed to within four by the end of the first half.

The second half started off slow with neither team scoring a point for the first three minutes. Platteville was the first to score on a free throw, but the Blugolds then went on a 9-0 run to push their lead to 12. Platteville once again did not let the Blugolds get too much of a lead though and used a 6-0 run to decrease the Blugolds' lead six. The Blugolds held on though and did just enough to keep Platteville off their heels, not allowing the Pioneers to get any closer than seven points the rest of the way.

Heidi Arciszewski (Sr.-Thorp, Wis.) once again led the Blugolds with 18 points, scoring 12 of them on free throws. For the game she went 12-for-12 from the line and has hit 39 straight free throws dating back to November 29. For the season she is 52-for-53 from the line. Arciszewski also led the Blugolds in rebounding tonight with eight.

Hannah Mesick (So.-Chatfield, Minn.) reached double-figures with 10 points. She also pulled down six boards. Heather Witt (Sr.-Kendall, Wis./Royall) led the game with five steals and added nine points, as Missy Fremstad (Sr.-Osseo, Wis./Osseo-Fairchild) also came up with nine.

Two Pioneers recorded double-digit point totals with Charity Stotmeister and Stacia Nemitz each coming up with 12. Dru Schneider led Platteville with eight rebounds.

In tonight's game Platteville shot better from the field, hitting 41.5 percent of shots, going 17-for-41, while Eau Claire was 18-for-53 (34 percent). However, the Blugolds hit five three pointers while the Pioneers only drained one. The Blugolds also got the job done rebounding, pulling down 33 to Platteville's 31, with 14 of Eau Claire's coming on the offensive end. The Blugolds also came up with 15 steals in the game and Platteville was only able to steal two.

The Blugolds will be back at home this Saturday to take on UW-La Crosse. The contest will be the second game of a doubleheader as the men will face La Crosse first at 3 p.m.

Eau Claire-Platteville Box Score

- KM -