Taft College women’s basketball coach Tyrone Taylor has been perplexed by the cold-shooting spells his team seems to go through in every game.

He’d hoped the Cougars could reverse the trend in Wednesday night’s Central Valley Conference opener against Reedley College in the Cougar Sports Center.

Instead, the Cougars had their longest chilly streak of the season when they went more than 10 minutes in the second half without scoring a single point.

During that span, Reedley poured in 20 points to pull away for a 61-48 victory.

When the Cougars hit the wall they were leading by six points (46-39) with 14 minutes left in the game.  Reedley would outscore them 22-2 the rest of the way.

The Cougars compounded their shooting woes with a rash of turnovers – some of them triggered by the Tigers’ full-court press but others the result of sloppy ball handling.

TC jumped out to a quick 13-6 lead and were ahead 23-17 when a pair of three-pointers by Jodee McMillen fueled a 10-0 run that pushed the Tigers into the lead.

Reedley was up 32-25 when the Cougars closed the half with a 7-0 run that began with Christine Taylor’s three-pointer and ended with four points from Crystal Clark.

The Cougars broke the tie less than a minute into the second half when Taylor, who led TC with 15 points, scored on a lay-up and made the two free-throws when Reedley’s Samantha Greene was called for a flagrant foul on the play.

A 6-0 run gave Taft a 44-37 lead before the big chill set in.

Clark had 10 points for the Cougars, Jasmine Green 8, Theresa Henderson 6, Victoria Worthy 5 and Baylee Day 4.

Reedley’s Monique Reed had a game-high 17points and Jasmine Waiters 15.

The loss drops the Cougars to 6-11 overall (0-1 conference) heading into Saturday’s 5 p.m. home tussle with defending champ Fresno City College.