Despite a career-high 26 points from freshman guard Grace Colaivalu, the CSU women's basketball dropped its Mountain West opener to Boise State 62-58 on Thursday at Moby Arena.
Colaivalu hit 8 of 13 shots from the floor, including 6 for 6 in the first half, to stake the Rams to a 32-24 halftime lead. But the Rams went cold in the third quarter, shooting 2 for 13 (15.4 percent) to enable the Broncos to take a 44-42 edge into the fourth quarter.
Sofie Tryggedsson opened the fourth quarter with a three-pointer for CSU and made a pair of free throws to give Colorado State a 47-44 lead with 8:28 to play. But Boise State's leading scorer Riley Lupfer responded with a pair of 3-pointers over the next two minutes and the Broncos' Joyce Harrell added a layup to put the Broncos ahead for good.
The Rams pulled within 57-56 on another Tryggedsson 3-pointer with just more than a minute to go but were forced to foul late and unable to come up with the equalizing shot.
"The maturity of this team will be tested,'' CSU coach Ryun Williams said. "The leadership of this team will be tested. Everybody's got the short turnaround. We're fortunate that we get to stay at home. But we can't play poorly on Saturday because we lost tonight. It's on to the next one.''
Colaivalu, who also shot 9 for 11 from the free throw line, had the most points in a single game by any Ram this season. Tryggedsson scored nine points, as did senior guard Hannah Tvrdy, who added six rebounds.
Colorado State (8-4. 0-1 MW) shot well in the first half before cooling off in the second. CSU shot 50 percent in the first half but dropped to 26.1 percent in the second half. Conversely, the Broncos (7-5, 1-0 MW) improved from 26.5 percent to 42.3 percent.
Boise State also finished with a 13-2 offensive rebounding advantage and scored 10 more second chance points.
The Rams next host San Jose State at 2 p.m. Saturday at Moby Arena.