The Blue Devil women’s basketball team used relentless full court pressure to take a big lead early in an 84-66 win over Minnesota State of Fergus Falls in Riverland Gym Wednesday.

Riverland (12-8 overall, 2-4 MCAC South) opened the game on 15-2 run over the first three minutes and the Spartans (4-14 overall, 2-4 MCAC South) never got closer than eight the rest of the way.

RCC created its early offense by forcing turnovers and getting breakaways. Brooke Rosenstiel, a sophomore guard from Mankato West, was a big recipient of the fast breaks as she finished with 16 points on 8-of-12 shooting.

“It gets me hyped up when one of my teammates gets a steal and we get score,” said Rosenstiel, who also chipped in eight rebounds, three assists and four steals. “We got some momentum going into it, because we were fired up before the game and I’m hoping to play like we did tonight against every team here on out.”

Fergus Falls scored the first three points of the second half to get within 50-31 and the Blue Devils were quick to answer with an 11-0 spurt over a two-minute stretch.

RCC head coach Suzy Hebrink was pleased with how her team held up after dropping four of its first five conference games.

“We just went on a streak of not playing focused and part of that came from a couple of tough losses against tougteams,” Hebrink said. “We needed to get started right away (tonight) and I thought we did a great job of putting the ball through the hoop and pressuring them.”

Austin grad Krista Viehauser had 24 points, 11 rebounds and five steals for RCC and Joni Lillo, who had four assists, scored all 15 of her points in the first half.

FF 28 38 — 66

RCC 50 34 — 84

RCC scoring: Krista Viehauser, 24; Brooke Rosenstiel, 16; Joni Lillo, 15; Krissy Schemmel, 8; Danyel Hythecker, 7; Robin Arjes, 6; Bridget Bergstrom, 3; Makenzie Martin, 2; Selena Gindratt, 2; Kim Craig, 1; field goals: 40 percent (30-for-76); three-pointers: 27 percent (4-for-15); free throws: 69 percent (20-for-29); rebounds: 47 (Viehauser, 11); turnovers: 22

FF scoring: Zaquia Taylor, 15; Emily Johnson, 14; Kendra Stokes, 11; Tanika Nguyen, 9; Whitney Moore, 9; Jordyn Campbell, 4; Whitney Swenson, 4; field goals: 35 percent (20-for-57); three-pointers: 36 percent (5-for-14); free throws: 75 percent (21-for-28); rebounds: 43 (Stokes, 9; Nguyen, 9); turnovers: 28