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GAME PREVIEW
After a hard week of final exams to conclude the fall academic quarter, the Central Washington University women's basketball team returns to action with three home games in four days at Nicholson Pavilion. The Wildcats begin that busy stretch -- which opens a five-game home stand overall -- with a Saturday night battle against The Evergreen State College (4-5) at 7 p.m.
FOR STARTERS
The Wildcats (3-4) step out of Great Northwest Athletic Conference play for the next three contests, beginning with Saturday's tilt against the Geoducks. CWU then hosts Hawai'i Pacific University on consecutive nights on Monday and Tuesday before breaking for the holidays.
CWU is looking to snap a three-game losing streak, all of which has taken place away from Nicholson Pavilion. The Wildcats dropped their first two GNAC games of the season on the road last weekend, falling 64-49 at Saint Martin's and then in overtime at Western Oregon, 71-63. The Wildcats has previously posted convincing wins over Quest University Canada (101-66 on Nov. 23) and California Baptist (92-66 on Nov. 29).
Senior guard
Jessica VanDyke (Chester, Mont./Chester-Joplin-Inverness HS) leads the Wildcats in both scoring and rebounding, averaging 20.3 points and 7.6 rebounds per contest. She has been the team's leading scorer in five of its seven counting games so far in 2013-14, including a career-high 30 points in the win over Cal Baptist. An all-tournament team selection at the season-opening Sodexo Tip-Off Classic, VanDyke has totaled 21 three-pointers made in seven games.
Junior forward
Courtney Johnson (Kent/Kentwood HS) joins VanDyke as a double-figure scorer, dropping in 11.9 points per game. She also averages 5.1 rebounds per contest in predominantly a reserve role, as Johnson has started just two of the team's seven games to date but is playing nearly 26 minutes per contest. Three-point shooting is Johnson's specialty, as she is shooting 45.7 percent (16 of 35) from three-point range and remains among the school's career leaders in long-range efficiency.
Johnson is expected to make her third start of the season on Saturday against Evergreen, with other projected starters including sophomore
Jasmine Parker (Spokane/Mead HS) and senior
Amber Moser (Willamina, Ore./Sheridan HS) in the frontcourt, and senior
Ally Schmitt (Snohomish) at point guard.
Parker and Moser are both averaging better than eight points per game, and Parker continues to rank among the top shot-blockers in the GNAC with 14 rejections in seven games. She is second to VanDyke with 6.6 rebounds per contest, and is coming off a 20-point, 12-rebound double-double at Western Oregon in her first career reserve appearance. Moser had a career-best 25-point effort at Cal Baptist on Nov. 29, which has accounted for nearly half of her 52 points on the season.
Schmitt, whose 25 assists in five games rank second in the GNAC, missed both conference games last week due to injury but is expected back against the Geoducks. She is also shooting 58.3 percent from the field this season and has a better than 3-to-1 assist-to-turnover ratio.
Evergreen, which is playing this game as an exhibition contest, has been a streaky team this year. The Geoducks lost their first two contests before winning four straight, but have since dropped three in a row including a 73-69 decision against the University of Puget Sound on Wednesday night in Olympia. Evergreen is 0-2 in Cascade Collegiate Conference games, having lost to Eastern Oregon (92-76) and College of Idaho (62-59) at home last weekend.
Leading Evergreen is Brittany Gray with 14.6 points, 8.7 rebounds, and 2.8 steals per contest. She has been the team's top scorer in four of the last six games, including a 29-point, 16-rebound effort at Pacific University on Nov. 26. Sammi Clark (13.2 ppg), Sadee Jones (12.2 ppg), and Jessica Denmon (10.9 ppg) are all double-figure scorers and projected starters for the Geoducks, who are coached by 13th-year mentor Monica Heuer.
SERIES HISTORY
CWU has won all six of the previous women's basketball meetings with Evergreen since the Olympia school first sponsored women's basketball in 1997-98. The two schools were conference foes for a brief time in the mid-1990s before the Wildcats left the NAIA ranks for the NCAA Division II prior to the 1998-99 campaign. CWU and ESC played twice in a five-day period as part of the Pacific Northwest Athletic Conference schedule in February 1998 to open their all-time series, but they have faced each other just four times since -- all CWU victories. Over the course of the series, the Wildcats are averaging 76.7 points per game and winning by an average spread of 28.2 points.
LAST WEEK'S GAMES
CWU opened GNAC play with a pair of road losses at Saint Martin's and Western Oregon. The Wildcats committed 18 first-half turnovers – and 25 for the game – in falling against the Saints on Dec. 5 in Lacey by a 64-49 final score. VanDyke had 16 points and eight rebounds, but CWU trailed from nearly start-to-finish and shot just 30 percent from the field. In Saturday's contest at WOU, the Wildcats overcame a 13-point halftime deficit by holding the Wolves to 19 second-half points, but were then outscored 15-7 in the five-minute overtime period in a 71-63 loss. Parker came off the bench to post a double-double of 20 points and 12 rebounds, while VanDyke nearly had a double-double of her own with 19 points and nine boards.
UPCOMING SCHEDULE
A five-game home stand, spread out over a three-week period, is on tap for the Wildcats and they could use some home cooking. The first three of the home games will take place between now and Tuesday night, with CWU hosting Hawai'i Pacific University on back-to-back nights Monday (5 p.m.) and Tuesday (7 p.m.). Then, the Crimson and Black will not play another game until Jan. 2, 2014, when they return to Great Northwest Athletic Conference play for the duration of the season with a home game against the University of Alaska Fairbanks. Alaska Anchorage will also visit Nicholson Pavilion on Jan. 4 before CWU plays its next away game on Jan. 9 at Western Washington.
CHANGE IN PLANS
The Wildcats' home stand was originally slated to be a six-gamer, but the Dec. 21 game against South Dakota School of Mines & Technology (a.k.a. South Dakota Mines) was canceled in November.
THREE-POINT PRODUCTION
One of the trademarks over head coach Shawn Nelson's career has been three-point shooting, and that trend has continued in his two-plus seasons coaching the Wildcats. CWU has broken the 200 mark in three-pointers made each of the past two seasons, marking the first two times in school history that a Wildcat women's team has reached that plateau. They have also attempted more than 600 treys each of the past two years – a feat that had been accomplished only once prior to Nelson's arrival (600 3FGA in 1999-2000).
MOVING UP THE CHARTS
The long-range shooting begins with senior
JESSICA VANDYKE, who transferred to CWU from Carroll College when Nelson left the Helena, Mont., school to become the Wildcats' head coach in June 2011. In just 59 career games in a CWU uniform, VanDyke is already fifth on the school's all-time list with 156 three-pointers made, and she needs just 16 to break the school's career mark in that category. Next on the list for her to pass is Hanna Hull, who made 157 treys in 102 games from 2004-08. The school record holder is Becki Matzen, who drained 171 threes in 100 career games from 1996-2000.
PROJECTED STARTERS
Here are the projected starters for both Central Washington and Evergreen for Saturday night's game at Nicholson Pavilion:
|
CENTRAL WASHINGTON |
EVERGREEN |
|
Pos. |
No. |
Name |
Pts. |
Reb. |
Ast. |
Pos. |
No. |
Name |
Pts. |
Reb. |
Ast. |
|
PG |
12 |
ALLY SCHMITT |
7.2 |
3.8 |
5.0 |
G |
11 |
Sammi Clark |
13.2 |
3.4 |
5.2 |
|
SG |
34 |
COURTNEY JOHNSON |
11.9 |
5.1 |
1.1 |
G |
15 |
Natasha Trinidad |
3.3 |
1.6 |
0.4 |
|
SF |
22 |
JESSICA VANDYKE |
20.3 |
7.6 |
1.4 |
G |
32 |
Jessica Denmon |
10.9 |
4.7 |
1.9 |
|
PF |
52 |
JASMINE PARKER |
8.9 |
6.6 |
0.3 |
G |
33 |
Sadee Jones |
12.2 |
5.9 |
2.0 |
|
C |
42 |
AMBER MOSER |
8.7 |
4.8 |
0.7 |
F |
21 |
Brittany Gray |
14.6 |
8.7 |
1.0 |
