CLAIRE C. LAURENCE/Arizona Daily Wildcat Linda Pace (left), Aimee Grzyb and Natalie Jones react after losing to Stanford in the championship game of the State Farm Pac-10 Tournament last night at HP Pavilion in San Jose, Calif. Arizona lost to Stanford 51-46.

UA blows late lead to Stanford

SAN JOSE, Calif. ÷ Going into the second half last night against Stanford, the Arizona women's basketball team was primed to get revenge for last year's loss to the Cardinal in the Pac-10 Tournament final.

But the Wildcats mustered just 15 second-half points and blew a double-digit lead, losing to Stanford again, 51-46, in the Pac-10 Tournament championship last night in HP Pavilion.

The No. 2-seed Wildcats (24-8, 14-4 Pacific 10 Conference) saw their six-game winning streak snapped against the No. 12 team in the nation.

The top-seeded Cardinal (24-6, 14-4) earned the Pac-10's automatic NCAA Tournament bid for the second straight season. They beat the Wildcats 59-49 in last year's championship game.

Arizona saw a 16-point first-half lead evaporate over a 10-minute span in which the Wildcats scored just two points.

The loss left many UA players in tears and holding their heads.

"They just got their momentum going and got the crowd into it, and then you just start second-guessing yourself a little bit," said UA head coach Joan Bonvicini.

Sophomore center Shawntinice Polk grabbed 18 rebounds but scored just eight points and was 2-of-8 from the free-throw line.

Polk missed 3-of-4 foul shots in the game's last two minutes.

The Wildcats led the entire game until Stanford's Sebnem Kimyacioglu sank a 3 to put the Cardinal ahead 44-42 with under five minutes left.

"That was a really strange game," said Stanford head coach Tara VanDerveer. "Arizona's a great team. I thought they played really well, but we didn't give up."

Arizona turned a 21-15 lead into a 16-point advantage, as sophomore guard Katrina Lindner and senior guard Aimee Grzyb each hit a 3 during a 10-0 UA run. Grzyb set a Pac-10 Tournament record with 11 3s in three tournament games.

"The first half, we played loose and we played confident," Bonvicini said.

Stanford responded with an eight-point spurt, all from junior guard Susan Borchardt, to cut the Wildcats' lead in half, 31-23, going into halftime.

Nicole Powell scored the first four points of the second half as the Cardinal cut Arizona's lead to four points in the half's first two minutes. Powell led all scorers with 24 points.

"With a team like Stanford, you can never be comfortable with a 16-point lead," Grzyb said with tears in her eyes.

"We've seen it many times when they've come back. I think we did pretty good on defense, but we couldn't hit our shots."

The Wildcats held Stanford to 32 percent shooting from the field, but shot just 6-of-26 (23 percent) themselves in the second.

"They just weren't falling," said junior guard Dee-Dee Wheeler.

Arizona out-rebounded the Cardinal 44-32, but Stanford committed just five turnovers to the Wildcats' 14.

Arizona lost for the second time this season when leading at halftime. The Wildcats scored their fewest points in a single game since Jan. 29, 1994 against Vanderbilt.

"For us, we have big things ahead of us, and we know this," Bonvicini said. "We've been on a six-game win streak, played very, very well down the stretch, and we're going to get our team back and play with great momentum, and represent the UA and represent the Pac-10, and do well in the NCAAs."

Arizona won't know who it's playing or where it's headed in the NCAA Tournament until Sunday's tournament selection show. First round tournament games begin Friday, March 19.