Down early Azusa Pacific bounced back with a huge second half to hand Hawaii Pacific their first PacWest loss with a 78-67 on Saturday afternoon.

Two weeks ago the Cougars dropped two of three league games and were sitting at 6-4 in the PacWest. With the three straight league wins and now a victory over PacWest first-place Hawaii Pacific (17-3, 12-1 PacWest) the Cougars have shown why they were picked to finish among the top teams in the conference. 

"We felt like if kept working on the small things and paid attention to the details we would start winning more," said head coach T.J. Hardeman. "We were in all of our games but we weren't playing a complete game. Now, we are getting closer to reaching our full potential."

Azusa Pacific has one more game on the Islands as they face off against Hawaii Hilo on Monday evening looking to go 3-for-3 on their trip. A huge second half that saw the Cougars outscore Hawaii Pacific 48-31 made Saturday's win possible. Azusa Pacific also committed a season low seven turnovers to aid in their victories charge. 

"In the second half today we started hitting our shots because we were moving the ball and finding he open player. We had 12 assists in the second half which shows that we were playing good team basketball," Hardeman said. "Plus I think our defense stepped up which helped translate into good looks on the offensive end."

Offensively a host of player led the charge for the Cougars. Kelly Hardeman scored 20 points in 29 minutes. Maggie Dumphy and Miriam Zabinsky each hit for 14 points while Katie Powell chipped in 11 points.

Cydnie Jones had a solid all-around game as the junior scored nine points, grabbed a team best 12 rebounds and handed out seven assists. Jones played all but five minutes of the contest. 

Azusa Pacific (13-7, 9-4 PacWest) started the game in fine fashion as they held a 6-2 lead but the home team got hot and the Cougars cooled off. Hawaii Pacific scored 25 of the game's next 35 points as they took their largest lead of the game at 27-16 with just over seven minutes until halftime. However, the Cougars finished the final period on a scoring spurt of their own. Azusa Pacific closed the frame on a 14-8 spurt to close their deficit to 35-30 at halftime.

The Sharks scored the first four points of the half before Azusa Pacific began to grab the contest's momentum. Trailing 39-30, the Cougars outscored the Hawaii Pacific 16-2 over a 3:38 stretch in taking a 46-41 lead. During that offensive onslaught Hardeman hit two three-pointers and Powell nailed one from deep in helping the Cougars to the lead. 

During the next three minutes Azusa Pacific kept their slim lead until they put the final dagger into the Sharks. With 9:04 left in the regulation the Cougars held a 53-51 lead in what looked to be a back-and-forth finish. Azusa Pacific put any doubts of who was the better team on this day by scoring 12 of the next 14 points to go in front 65-53 with just under five minutes left.

Hawaii Pacific wasn't able to get their deficit within a workable margin down the stretch as they dropped their first home game of the season.