STORRS, Conn. — Connecticut guard Ketia Swanier's credentials for the Big East Conference's sixth-man award may be in jeopardy.

The senior started her second consecutive game and scored a career-high 20 points yesterday, leading the top-ranked Huskies to a 98-41 rout of St. John's.

UConn coach Geno Auriemma said he's been notified by the conference that if Swanier starts twice more this season, she'll be declared ineligible for the award that honors the conference's top reserve.

"I'm going to have to take that into consideration, because I'd hate for her to lose something that I think she deserves," Auriemma said.

Swanier, one of four seniors honored before their final on-campus game, hit 6 of 9 3-pointers and had five assists and four steals. She moved into the starting lineup on Wednesday against Marquette, after spending most of the season as Connecticut's first player off the bench.

St. John's, already a big underdog, suspended six players before the game. Kia Wright, Nikki Jo Rotolo, Charisse Curtis, Kristin Moore, Sheree Ledbetter and Recee Mitchell violated a team policy, coach Kim Barnes Arico said.

"They didn't do anything terrible," she said. "There's no drinking, drugs or anything like that. They just made a poor decision that I was really unhappy with."

The Red Storm's remaining six players each played at least 27 minutes.

Kelly McManmon led the Red Storm (13-13, 4-9) with 15.

Renee Montgomery and Maya Moore each added 18 for UConn (26-1, 13-1 Big East), which remained a half-game ahead of Rutgers for first place in the conference. The two teams play each other in the regular-season finale March 3.

NO. 5 RUTGERS 62, PROVIDENCE 43

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Essence Carson scored 16 points, Kia Vaughn had 11 points and 10 rebounds, and the Scarlet Knights (22-4, 11-1 Big East) raced to a 21-8 lead in the first nine minutes and never looked back in giving coach Vivian Stringer her 799th career victory with a rout of the Friars (12-14, 2-11).

NO. 7 STANFORD 60, NO. 8 CALIFORNIA 58

BERKELEY, Calif. — Jayne Appel scored 13 of her 16 points in the second half and Candice Wiggins overcame a bad shooting game to score the go-ahead basket down the stretch, helping the Cardinal (25-3, 14-2) beat the Golden Bears (23-4, 14-2) to take control of the Pac-10 race.