LA VERNE, CA — The Leopards erased an 11-point deficit near the end of the third and made a remarkable comeback led by Chiara Brown's historic night.

Brown scored a career-high 43 points to lead the University of La Verne women's basketball team to a 71-66 win over Occidental College Saturday night.

Brown scored 16 of her 43 points in the fourth quarter alone and took over the game midway through the period, scoring 14 straight points to turn a 57-52 deficit into a 65-62 Leopards' lead with 36 seconds left in the game. Brown also added 11 rebounds and two blocks for her sixth double-double of the season.

"Her performance speaks for itself. Great player, great leader. We've asked her to step up in a leadership role this year. She's done a great job doing it and continues to show us that we can trust her down the stretch and that we can keep the ball in her hands," said La Verne women's basketball head coach Anthony Mason.

Marissa Howell sealed the win for the Leopards with clutch free throws in the final 23 seconds of the game. She went 6-6 in front of the charity stripe to close the win for the Leopards. Howell scored 11 of her 12 points in the fourth quarter, including a jumper from the top of the key and a huge three to help the comeback in the fourth.

"One of the great things about Marissa is that she stays calm. She's even-keeled. Up 20, down 20, whether she's hit six threes in a row or missed six. So we know that when it's time for them to foul, we can get the ball in her hands and she's going to be calm, steady, and knock them down," added Mason.

Occidental's Toni Thompson, who led the Tigers led with 28 points, scored nine points in the fourth including a huge three-pointer to bring Occidental within three with nine seconds left in the game.

Naomi Jackson finished with seven points and five rebounds in the win. Alyssa Smith grabbed eight boards and three assists.

"We just had to stick to our game plan. We did our best to slow the game down. We have a great PG [Jackson] who does a great job of controlling the tempo, and we trust our defense to get stops." said Mason.

La Verne improves to 7-3 overall and 3-1 in the SCIAC. Occidental moves to 10-2 overall and 3-2 in conference play.

The Leopards will continue conference play on the road and take on Cal Lutheran University Wednesday, January 10th at 7 p.m