Box Score The Golden Grizzlies kicked off conference play in fine performance beating the Thunderbirds of Southern Utah 5-1 Thursday. The game is the first conference game in the Mid-Continent Conference for the Grizzlies and improves Oakland's regular season record to 4-7 and puts their conference record at 1-0. Southern Utah falls to 1-12 on the season and holds a record of 1-1 in the conference. The game was played in Cedar City, Utah and proved a good start to Oakland's weekend in play. "It was good to get the first win of the conference," commented head coach Nick O'Shea. "It's good to be able to build momentum in important games." Natilie Simas (So., Kitchener, Ont.) lead the Grizzlies with two goals. Simas (So., Kitchener, Ont.) tallied her first goal at 15:17 of the opening half on a rebound off a missed shot that hit the crossbar to give OU a quick 1-0 lead. The Grizzlies scored two more goals in the span of three minutes later in the frame, started by Jenny Young's (So., Davison, MI) goal scored off a feed from Kelly Rieck (So., Shelby Township, MI) at 29:25, which was followed by Erica Demer's (Jr., Welland, Ont.) score off an SUU deflection at 32:10, to race out to a 3-0 advantage. Oakland then iced the game just 11 seconds into the second half as Ingrid Mortensen (Fr., Tromsdalem, Norway) beat SUU keeper Megan Flowers with a cross shot from the left side to extend the lead to 4-0. SUU broke through near the end of the 69th-minute as sophomore Elysia Cannon scored her first goal of the year off a free-kick pass from Annie Payne. Payne's assist, her fifth of the year, added to her SUU single-season record and conference co-lead with OU's own Kristi Swaving (Fr., Alburquerque, NM), who assisted on Mortensen's (Fr., Tromsdalem, Norway) goal earlier in the match. Simas (So., Kitchener, Ont.) then closed the scoring with her second goal at 72:26 off a pass from Mortensen (Fr., Tromsdalem, Norway) in the SUU box. Oakland outshot SUU 26-16, including a 13-9 edge on goal. OU keeper Sarah Buckland (Jr., Burlington, Ont.) allowed just one goal and stopped eight T-Bird shots to take the decision while SUU's Flowers made eight saves in the losing effort. Nick O'Shea was quick to point out some highlights in OU's players who made an impact in the game. "Erica and Kelly played well and effectively controlled the midfield," said O'Shea. "It was nice to see Nat score up top and she played a good game along with Ingrid who made intelligent runs up front." Oakland continues its conference play on the road this weekend with a game against Oral Roberts on Sunday at 1 p.m., local time.