GAMES: UND will split home and road games this weekend. The Sioux will start conference play facing off against the South Dakota Coyotes at 3 p.m at Bronson Field on Friday. Following their home game UND will travel to Waterloo, Iowa to take on the Northern Iowa Panthers at 1 p.m.
COYOTES: Friday's matchup will be the 18th meeting between these two teams in which South Dakota leads with eight wins and two ties. The Coyotes swept the Sioux last year over four games. The contest will be each teams first conference game of the season. The Sioux defense will have their hands full with freshman forward Jenny Teslow. Teslow has won GWC Offensive Player of the Week twice this season and is leading the Coyotes with six goals and two assists on the season. USD was picked to finish last in the West Division of the GWC, but is currently second to 2009 Conference Champion Utah Valley.
PANTHERS: The Sioux will travel to Waterloo, Iowa to take on the Panthers who UND will be facing off against for the fourth year in a row. UNI leads the series 2-1 and have won both times at home so the Sioux are looking to break that trend on Sunday. The Panthers finished 2-11-3 overall and 0-5-1 in their conference last year. They also are returning all 11 of their starters, including last years goals and points leader, forward Chelsie Hochstedler along with 2009 assists leader, forward Nicole Ferlito.
PREVIOUS ACTION: The UND Fighting Sioux returned home this Sunday to face off the Minnesota State-Mankato Mavericks. Both teams were playing pretty rough to start the game with 14 fouls between the two teams in the first period. There were 28 combined fouls over the double overtime game and two yellow cards issued one to MSU midfielder Tori Meinhardt and the other on UND midfielder Kelsey Zachman. The first half featured a hard fought defensive battle with both sides' keepers playing it very tight. The Sioux had six shots, while the Mavericks had seven on their way to a scoreless first half. The second half had the Mavericks taking 14 shots on goal to UND's three, but UND was able to score first at the 69:04 mark off a penalty kick by Sheri Stapf. The Sioux held MSU in check until the 82:24 mark when defenseman Nicole Dooher broke free and scored unassisted to take the game to overtime. The first overtime went scoreless, but the second overtime decided the victor as MSU's Brittany Henry scored at 104:11 off an assist by midfielder Cassie Weik. Junior forward Rachael Loomis (Fargo, N.D.) led the Sioux with four shots and three of them on goal. Keeper Monica Stierman (Mahtomedi, Minn.) had nine saves on the game.
FUTURE SCHEDULE:
UND will continue on the road as they take on conference leader Utah Valley in Orem, Utah at 4 p.m. on Oct. 14. Following the UTU game the Sioux head to Texas to face off against Houston Baptist at 1 p.m. on Oct. 16.
