The Buena Vista women's basketball team used a key 13-3 run to close out the first and began the second half with an 11-0 spurt, and the Beavers never looked back en route to a commanding 89-71 Iowa Conference victory over visiting Simpson College on Saturday afternoon.

Both teams were cold from the field for nearly the first 10 minutes of the second half, but Simpson was able to build a 21-13 lead with 7:46 left in the period.  Lexie Moreno later hit a three to get BVU back within a point at 23-22 with 5:21 to go and the Beavers stayed within three until going on their run to close the half.

Lexi Fisher, who scored a team-best 22 points, hit a three-pointer to make it 27-27 and later hit back-to-back three's to close the half, including one just before the first-half buzzer sounded to give the team a 41-31 halftime lead.

BVU then hit three more treys to begin the second half, including two more by Fisher, as part of an 11-0 run that pushed its lead to 52-41 less than two minutes in.

Simpson tried to claw back, but was never able to get closer than 14.  The Storm made it 70-56 with less than 11 minutes to go, but four straight free-throws from BVU extended its advantage back to 18, and the Beavers virtually maintained that lead the rest of the way.

Fisher finished 7-of-13 from the field, including a career-high six three-pointers (6-of-10).  She also grabbed six rebounds, dished out four assists and added three steals.

Sophomore Jasmyn Flynn-Graves also had a career performance off the bench, scoring 19 points and hauling in five rebounds.  Fellow sophomore Lacey Vokt made 13 straight free-throws and finished 13-of-14 overall to finish with 16 points.  Junior Shelby Wiederhoeft was also big in the post, posting a double-double with 11 points and 11 rebounds.

As a team, the Beavers shot 42 percent from the field, including 9-of-19 from downtown, but did a large portion of its work at the charity stripe where they sank 36-of-42 attempts.

BVU also held a large advantage on the glass, out-rebounding the Storm, 50-23.

The win gave the Beavers the sixth and final spot into this year's Iowa Conference Tournament after the team had missed out on the event each of the last two years.  BVU, now 11-14 overall (5-9 IIAC) will be the sixth-seed and will travel to play #3 Dubuque on Tuesday night in the quarterfinal round at 7:00pm.