SANTA CLARA, Calif. – In a game that came down to the wire, Santa Clara women's basketball topped Pepperdine 62-60 on Thursday night. Despite having a double-digit lead in the fourth quarter and never trailing the whole night, the Broncos had to fight in the final minutes to hang on for the victory.

With just under five minutes to go in the game, Pepperdine went on a 9-0 run over two minutes to cut the deficit to 57-55. It was the closest the game had been since Santa Clara led 5-4 with 6:50 on the clock in the opening period.

Brooke Gallaway hit two clutch free throws with 32 seconds on the clock to make it a two-possession game, which proved to be crucial as Erica Ogumike followed with a three-point play.

"I am really proud of our resilience tonight," said Santa Clara head coach JR Payne. "With Savanna [Hanson] not in the lineup [due to injury] we had multiple people playing in different positions. We did a great job of sticking together and getting a true team win. Execution down the stretch on both ends of the floor was critical and I was proud of our focus in that area."

Santa Clara (13-5, 4-3 WCC) got a game-high 21 points from Lori Parkinson on 10 of 17 shooting from the floor. Dru Toleafoa scored 11 behind three 3-pointers.

The Bronco defense forced 24 turnovers and scored 23 points off of them. They also collected 12 steals and scored 28 points in the paint.

E. Ogwumike led Pepperdine (5-12, 1-5 WCC) with 21 points on 9 of 11 shooting from the charity stripe. She added eight rebounds and four steals. Olivia Ogumike scored 11 with five boards and Kietra Wallace added nine points and six rebounds.

Despite the trouble late in the game, Santa Clara started out on the right foot.

With the scored tied 4-all, the Broncos went on a 10-2 run over 2:45 in the first quarter to take the lead they would never give up.

They also stormed out of the gates in the second half and used a 12-1 run to build a game-high lead of 47-29 with just 3:28 to go in the third quarter.

Santa Clara returns to action Saturday at 2 p.m. at LMU.