Women’s basketball hits the road
The Minnesota State women’s basketball team will head out on their final road trip of the season Friday, with their first stop at Upper Iowa at 6 p.m. The final game of the regular season will be at Winona State on Saturday at 4 p.m.
The Mavericks, who have won four of their last five games, are coming off an 83-55 win over the St. Cloud Huskies. The victory propelled the team to an overall record of 13-9 and a Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference (NSIC) record of 9-9.
“We are coming off one of our best and most complete performances of the season last Saturday against St. Cloud. It was great to see our team bring a defensive intensity from the tip and to sustain that for the entire game,” said head coach Emilee Theisse about the series.
Minnesota State got going early on, finishing the first quarter 23-12 after Logan Anderson converted a three-point play giving the Mavericks a 10-point lead. The Mavericks finished off the first half with a 21-point lead over the Huskies. The weekend series gave senior Maverick, Karina Schroeder, back-to-back double-double games for her third of the season and two three-pointers in the third. The team ended up shooting 43.5% [30-69] from the field and 75% [15-20] from the free throw line. Brittany Scherber contributed a game-high 21 points for Minnesota State while Claire Ziegler also put up double-digits while adding six rebounds.
“Without a doubt, we are going to have to bring that defensive focus with us on the road this weekend for our final regular season road trip. Our team has learned that when we make plays defensively, we are a good basketball team and we bring that intensity to all of the other areas of the game,” said Theisse.
Minnesota State is averaging 72.5 points per game, third in the NSIC, compared to the 67.6 by its opponents. They are also collecting 43.9 rebounds, first in the NSIC, posting 55 against St. Cloud State for the second highest total of the season. The team has a 13-2 record when leading in rebounds this season.
The Upper Iowa Peacocks have a record of 3-19 overall and 3-15 in the NSIC. The Mavericks, who have already defeated the Peacocks once with a final score of 74-63 on Dec. 10, lead the all-time series against Upper Iowa 19-0. Upper Iowa is averaging 60.0 points per game versus their opponents’ 71.6 and accumulating 36.3 rebounds per game.
The second game of the series, the Mavericks will face the No. 23 ranked Winona State Warriors. The Warriors have an overall record of 19-5 with a 14-4 NSIC record. WSU have won three of their last four with a recent 65-53 victory over Northern State. The Mavericks fell 79-64 in their first meeting with the Warriors Dec. 9 at the Taylor Center with WSU leading the all-time series 34-17. The team is averaging 67.7 points per game, as opposed to their opponents’ 57.5 while leading the NSIC field goal percentage (.460) and three-point shooting percentage (.382) this season.
The Mavericks will return home to face the Southwest Minnesota State Mustangs at 6 p.m. on February 17 at the Taylor Center to close out the regular season.