HAYWARD, Calif. -- Tournament host and No. 1 seed Cal State East Bay opened the game with a 13-2 sprint and closed it with a 13-5 run.  For the other 30 minutes of play, Azusa Pacific out-scored the Pioneers, 67-56, but that wasn't enough as Cal State East Bay held on to beat Azusa Pacific, 82-74, in the semifinals of the NCAA Division II Women's Basketball West Regional Saturday night.

With the game tied at 69-69 with 4 minutes left to play, Cal State East Bay seemingly found an extra gear as it punched the pedal to the medal for the finish line.  The Cougars, perhaps physically and emotionally gassed from last night's OT victory over Cal State San Marcos, could not answer the Pioneers' push and had to settle for the season-ending loss.

"We weren't staying sharp when we needed to," said Cougar sophomore guard Paige Uyehara, who finished with a team-high 18 points.  "It came down to us having mental lapses, and East Bay capitalized on those opportunities."

With the win, Cal State East Bay advances to Monday's regional title game against Western Washington, a 64-58 victor over rival Central Washington in this evening's other semifinal.  A trip to the NCAA Elite Eight will be on the line in that regional championship game.

The Pioneers led 13-2 lead just 4 minutes into tonight's game.  However, behind the play of sophomore reserve forward Kelly Heimburger the Cougars rallied to take a 16-15 lead when Heimburger scored all 8 of her points on the night with a pair of three-pointers surrounding a 13-foot jumper in the key.  From there the two teams exchanged the lead 15 more times and tied it another 9.

Using Uyehara on several isolation plays, the Cougars moved out to a 27-20 lead early in the second quarter, but the Pioneers rallied to within one at 35-34 at halftime.

As a possible sign of the Cougars wearing down, the Pioneers pulled away early in the fourth quarter, opening up a 10-point lead at 67-57 with just under 7 minutes left in the game.  With one last gasp, however, Azusa Pacific answered with its own 12-2 run.  Kayla Shaw, the Cougars' leading scorer on the season but who had been bottled up by a focused Pioneer defense, scored 7 on her 15 points during the run, which was capped by Alex Louden's 2 free throws that tied the game at 69-69 with 4:23 remaining.

Given the Cougars' storied history of late-game dramatics in the NCAA Tournament, including last night when Uyehara nailed a 3-pointer at the buzzer to force overtime, it just seemed that this game was shaping up for another APU dramatic win.   However, East Bay would have none of it, closing the game on a 13-5 run over the final 4 minutes, when the Cougars committed 2 of their 19 turnovers on the night and missed 3 free throws.

Sophomore Molly Whitmore chipped in 10 points while Lowden finished with 9 points and 7 rebounds.

Azusa Pacific closes the year at 23-4, the fewest losses by a Cougar program since 1977 when APU went 15-1 under head coach Sue Hebel.