VANCOUVER – For the sixth straight game, forward Kara Spotton (Fort Collins, Colo.) led the UBC Thunderbirds in scoring, recording 27 points on Sunday afternoon in her team's 78-63 loss to the Western Mustangs at War Memorial Gymnasium.
 
Spotton's total came on 11 field goals and five foul shots. She also added six rebounds and five steals for the Thunderbirds.
 
Western got a 22-point performance from Mackenzie Puklicz and 21 points from Julia Curran.
 
The Mustangs pulled away late, outscoring the Thunderbirds 21-12 in the fourth quarter to leave Vancouver with a double-digit win.
 
Spotton's jumper two minutes into the fourth closed Western's lead to 59-53, but the Mustangs reeled off the next nine points, thanks in part to four steals, to go up by 15, which ended up being the final margin of victory.
 
It was a one-possession game early in the third quarter but a Western surge increased the gap to 11 points.
 
The Thunderbirds got three straight buckets from Spotton as well as one from Krysten Lindquist (Markham, Ont.) to help close the deficit to six at the end of the quarter.
 
The teams battled back and forth in the first half. UBC scored eight straight points – four from Spotton and two each from Chelsea Hamming (Calgary) and Shilpa Khanna (Surrey, B.C.) – to go ahead 32-24 with three and a half minutes remaining in the second quarter, but Western immediately replied with an 11-0 run to take a 35-32 lead into the mid-game break.
 
UBC, 2-4 in non-conference play so far this season, will host two games at War Memorial Gymnasium next weekend. The Thunderbirds will play Thompson Rivers on Friday, Oct. 30 and MacEwan on Oct. 31. Both games will tip off at 5 p.m.