SANTA CLARA, Calif. – In the final nonconference game of the regular season, Santa Clara women's basketball topped UC Santa Barbara 66-48 on Friday night. With its ninth consecutive win, the team is on the longest winning streak since also winning nine in a row during the 2005-06 season.

Santa Clara's nine nonconference wins are the most in a season since winning 11 against nonconference opponents in 2007-08. That year the Broncos finished 20-11, the last season they won 20 or more games.

"We didn't have a great start but in the end we did a good job of executing towards the end of the third quarter and in the fourth," said Santa Clara head coach JR Payne. "It wasn't the prettiest game but we're happy with the outcome."

Santa Clara (9-2) had four players in double figures with Lori Parkinson's 15 leading the way. She added nine rebounds to lead the team.

"Lori is starting to become a lot more comfortable," said Payne. "We're playing her at a position she's never played before so it's taken her some time to get to where she wants to be."

Morgan McGwire scored 13 with seven boards and six blocks. Marie Berthold added 11 with six rebounds and four assists while Savanna Hanson scored 10.

UC Santa Barbara (1-11) was held to just 29.4 percent (15 of 51) shooting by the Bronco defense. The Gauchos committed 31 turnovers with 17 coming on Santa Clara steals. Jasmine Ware led UC Santa Barbara with 10 points.

"We have a couple different zones that we like and we were trying to mix it up defensively when we could. We wanted to keep them on their toes," said Payne.

A quick start to the second half for UC Santa Barbara saw the Gauchos cut the lead to 25-23 but after exchanging baskets, the Broncos scored 14 straight to take a 42-26 lead with 2:29 to go in the third quarter.

"The second half was much better," said Payne. "Once we settled in we were able to execute and play a pretty clean game. We showed that we've matured a lot since the opening weekend and that we've improved as a ball club."

The Broncos started to use their size to pull away in the fourth. Morgan McGwire scored six points in the span of two minutes. Santa Clara connected on 6 of 8 from the floor during one stretch in the quarter to make the score 62-40.

Santa Clara forced 16 UC Santa Barbara turnovers in the opening half and picked up nine steals. The Broncos, however, committed 12 turnovers of their own. Neither team was sharp from the field with Santa Clara shooting 29.6 percent (8 of 27) and the Gauchos shooting 30.8 percent (8 of 26).

"Turnovers plagued us the first time against UC Santa Barbara and they did again tonight in the first half," said Payne. "They play a style that is kind of scrappy and some of our troubles were jitters because we hadn't played in six days."

Parkinson scored six of the final eight points for Santa Clara in the first half. Miller hit a three with 2:16 on the clock for the only Gauchos' points in the final six minutes of the second quarter.

Santa Clara returns to action Monday at 6 p.m. vs. Pacific in the West Coast Conference opener.