UP NEXT FOR NORTH DAKOTA
After snapping its seven-game slump with a 77-66 win over Texas A&M-Corpus Christi in game one of the Montana Lady Griz Holiday Classic, the University of North Dakota women's basketball team is looking to close out the 2010 portion of the season with back-to-back wins.
This evening, the Fighting Sioux will take on host Montana in the tournament finale. Tip-off is slated for 8 p.m. at Dahlberg Arena in Missoula, Mont.
LIVE FROM MISSOULA
Wednesday's game against Montana will be broadcast live on KSNR 100.3 FM (CatCountry) with Paul Ralston handling the play-by-play. All Fighting Sioux women's basketball games - home and away - can be heard on KSNR 100.3 FM (CatCountry) and on select stations across the Fighting Sioux radio network. Stay tuned for schedule changes.
Provided by the Montana athletics department, fans can also follow the action via a live audio/video webcast and live stats.
Links for the radio broadcast, the audio/video webcast, and live stats can be found on the official site of North Dakota athletics, FightingSioux.com.
TOURNAMENT HISTORY
The Lady Griz Holiday Classic was held for 29 straight years between 1980-81 and 2008-09. No tournament was held last year when one of the two visiting teams canceled late and could not be replaced.
The first four years the tournament was held in early January, then it moved to early to mid December for eight years. It's been held the week between Christmas and New Year's since the 1992-93 edition.
Montana has gone 55-3 the previous 29 tournaments and has won 26 of the 29 Classic titles.
Washington won the title in the tournament's first year, 1980-81, and Drake won in 1981-82. The Lady Griz won the next 16 tournaments. Arkansas stopped that streak with a championship in 1998-99, and Montana has won the last 10.
The Lady Griz' three losses in the Classic have all come in the title game: 64-59 to Washington, 71-65 to Drake and 74-54 to Arkansas.
TOURNAMENT DETAILS
Since the pairings were predetermined, there will not be a semifinals-consolation-championship game format and no first-place trophy awarded for the tournament. However, there will be a five-player all-tournament team, one of whom is the tournament MVP.
SERIES HISTORY ... MONTANA
- Overall: Tied at 1-1
- Home: Tied at 0-0
- Away: Tied at 0-0
- Neutral: Tied at 1-1
Tuesday's game will mark the first time in 26 years that the North Dakota and Montana women's basketball teams have met on the hardwood.
The teams first met on Dec. 29, 1977 at the Montana State Invitational in Bozeman, Mont. The Grizzlies won the series opener by a score of 64-48.
Seven years later, the Fighting Sioux knotted the series at 1-1 with a 49-46 win over UM in the final game of the Montana State-Billings Classic in Billings, Mont.
North Dakota and Montana have never faced each other outside of a tournament in December hosted by an institution in Montana.
SCOUTING THE GRIZZLIES (4 -8)
The University of Montana women's basketball team snapped a four-game skid on Tuesday with a 75-53 win over Utah Valley in game two of the Lady Griz Holiday Classic on Missoula, Mont.
Against the Wolverines, three Grizzlies finished in double figures. Kenzie De Boer led the team with 13 points followed by Katie Baker with 12 points and Sarah Ena with 11. Stephanie Stender led the team with eight rebounds (four offensive).
Baker leads the team overall averaging 11.0 points and 8.1 rebounds per game. She has also tabbed a team best 13 blocks. Baker posted a 23-point, 11-rebound double-double during UM's 76-69 overtime loss to James Madison (Nov. 26) and doubled up again with 19 points and 12 rebounds on Dec. 2 against Denver.
Ena is averaging 9.3 points per game and is shooting a team best .434 (43-for-99) from the field.
Smith and Torry Hill have both banked 45 points from beyond the three-point line.
The Lady Griz are 3-3 when playing on their home court.
MONTANA HEAD COACH ROBIN SELVIG
University of Montana women's basketball coach Robin Selvig is in his 33rd season with the Lady Griz in 2010-11. It is his 38th year as either a player or a coach at his alma mater.
Selvig's is a career marked not just by longevity and loyalty, but also the sustained and mostly unrivaled success of the Lady Griz program.
In his first 32 years, Selvig has coached Montana to a record of 740-218 (.772) with an average of over 23 wins per season. During that time, the Lady Griz have had 30 winning and 27 20-win seasons, they have won 22 regular-season conference championships and have advanced to 18 NCAA tournaments.
Selvig's victory total and career winning percentage have his name mingling with the coaching giants of the profession in the NCAA record book.
Selvig entered the season ranked sixth among active coaches in victories with 740. He trails only Tennessee's Pat Summitt (1,037), Rutgers' C. Vivian Stringer (843), North Carolina's Sylvia Hatchell (831), Stanford's Tara VanDerveer (793) and Georgia's Andy Landers (750).
Prior to the beginning of the season, Selvig ranked eighth in winning percentage at .772. Filling the seven spots above him are Connecticut's Geno Auriemma (.858), Summitt (.841), VanDerveer (.803), Arkansas-Little Rock's Joe Foley (.780), Chattanooga's Wes Moore (.777), Baylor's Kim Mulkey (.776) and Texas's Gail Goestenkors (.773).
His 27 20-win seasons at Montana is a feat surpassed by only Summitt (34 20-win seasons), Stringer (30) and former Texas coach Jody Conradt (29) in women's Division I history.
NOTING THE FIGHTING SIOUX (2-8)
Picked to repeat as Great West Conference champions in the 2010-11 preseason coaches poll, the University of North Dakota women's basketball team is in its third year of transition towards NCAA Division I status.
Thanks to a career effort by senior co-captain Mallory Youngblut, the Fighting Sioux put an end to its non-conference woes with a 77-66 win over Texas A&M-Corpus Christi.
With 31 points, Youngblut posted the first 30-point game of her career and the first for UND since Kierah Kimbrough had a pair of 30-point games during the 2008-09 season.
Youngblut and freshman center Allyssa Wall (North Sioux City, S.D.) lead the team averaging 10.8 points per game. Wall is shooting a team-high .506 (39-for-77) from the field while Youngblut is leading the team at the free throw line with a .880 (22-for-25) shooting percentage.
Wall leads the team with 22 blocked shots and has finished in double figures in all but four games this season.
Senior forward Corey Lof (Detroit Lakes, Minn.) is UND's top rebounder with an average of 5.1 boards per game. She is followed by Wall with 4.9 rebounds per game and freshman Madi Buck with 4.7 rebounds per game. Against TAMUCC, Buck notched a career-high 16 rebounds.
Junior guard Charnay Mothershed (Phoenix, Ariz.) landed her first double-digit game for the Sioux with 10 points against the Islanders on Tuesday. She leads the team in assists (41) and steals (19).
Leading the Sioux beyond the arc is freshman Megan Lauck (Arden Hills, Minn.). She is 13-for-33 for a .394 shooting percentage.
THIS DAY IN FIGHTING SIOUX HISTORY :: DEC. 29
- Overall: 9-3
- Home: 4-0
- Away: 4-1
- Neutral: 1-2
The University of North Dakota played its first Dec. 29 game in 1977 at the Montana State Invitational in Bozeman, Mont. On that day, UND fell to Montana 64-48. Since that day, the Fighting Sioux have gone 9-3 overall when playing on the 363rd day of the year.
UND's first Dec. 29 win came in 1989 when under the guidance of Gene Roebuck, the Sioux defeated Wayne State (Neb.) 110-36 in Grand Forks. That game stands as the sixth-highest scoring game for the Sioux in program history.
On average, UND is out-scoring its opponents 78-61 when playing on the 29th of December.
RECORD REWIND
The University of North Dakota women's basketball program holds a 770-289 (.727) record all-time since the first game was played in 1974. Under head coach Gene Roebuck, UND is 594-125 (.826).
Click on the PDF link above for the complete game notes release ...
- Go Sioux -
