No. 10 Arizona St. 75, UC Irvine 46

12/15/2006 12:10 AM

IRVINE, Calif. (AP) -Arizona State may have room for improvement, as its coach says, but that didn't stop the Sun Devils from extending a two-season stretch of dominance Thursday night.

Emily Westerberg and Dymond Simon scored 13 points apiece to lead No. 10 Arizona State to a 75-46 rout of UC Irvine.

Aubree Johnson and Danielle Orsillo each added 12 points for the Sun Devils (9-1), who earned their fifth consecutive victory and 18th in 19 regular-season games since last season.

``It's a work in progress,'' said Arizona State coach Charli Turner Thorne, who noted that Westerberg is playing inside for the first time in three seasons, and that the Sun Devils missed two crucial reserves for most of this season.

``We've had a tough go of it these last few weeks and we just finished finals,'' Turner Thorne said. ``We've been off for eight days so it was nice just to get back on the floor.''

Angie Ned and Naomi Halman scored 11 points apiece for the Anteaters (2-6), who have lost five of six. Christina Zdenek added 10 points and Stephanie Duda grabbed 11 rebounds.

Irvine played without leading scorer Kelly Cochran, who averages 12.4 points. She missed her third consecutive game after injuring her right knee last week in practice.

Arizona State took a 17-0 lead in the first 6:11 of the game. UC Irvine did not score a point in the first 6:27 and did not make a basket until 10:23 remained in the first half.

``Arizona State has a great defense,'' said UC Irvine coach Molly Tuter, whose team played UCLA, another Pacific-10 Conference contender, on Dec. 4.

``UCLA is very talented; Arizona State is talented and very disciplined,'' Tuter said. ``(The Sun Devils are) deep. I can't really name a weakness they have.''

The Sun Devils built a 25-point halftime lead, then started the second half with a 14-4 run powered by six points from Westerberg. Arizona State led by as many as 44 points.