North Dakota vs. Weber State || 12/7 (7 p.m.)
16th meeting; WSU leads 10-5
Grand Forks, N.D. (Betty Engelstad Sioux Center)

FULL GAME NOTES ARE HERE

GRAND FORKS, N.D. - North Dakota returns to what has been an unfamiliar spot during its first eight games of the season; it's home floor. The Hawks are back in action inside the Betty for just the second time this season as UND plays host to Weber State in the Big Sky-Summit Challenge on Saturday. Tip-off from inside the Betty Engelstad Sioux Center is set for 7 p.m. Fans can follow the action live with UND men's basketball radio play-by-play voice Paul Ralston on KSNR 100.3 FM The Cat or on the iHeart Radio app, while the action will be available Midco Sports/Summit League Network. Live stats will be provided at www.FightingHawks.com.

SERIES HISTORY
UND and Weber State meet for the 16th time on the hardwood with the Wildcats holding a 10-5 lead in a series that began in January of 2013 when both programs were Big Sky members. WSU won the first eight meetings and nine of the first ten, before the Hawks won four-straight games across the 2016-17 and 2017-18 seasons. Weber State won the most recent matchup in Ogden. The two squads have played some thrillers throughout the series which includes a trio of neutral site contests in the Big Sky Tournament. UND lost by a bucket in March of 2013 and was edged by five in an overtime contest in the tournament semifinals in 2016. The next season, the Hawks enacted revenge winning 93-89 in overtime to capture the tournament championship.

LAST TIME OUT
Junior guard Treysen Eaglestaff, in his 40th consecutive start for North Dakota, led three other Fighting Hawks in double-figure scoring with two dozen points, senior forward Amar Kuljuhovic followed with 17 points, and a dozen rebounds for his ninth double-double as a Hawk, and the Hawks hit 50% of its shots from the floor on Wednesday night against Eastern Washington in the Big Sky-Summit Challenge. However, the host Eagles also shot 50% including a 12-for-22 effort from beyond-the-arc and edged UND in rebounding to win the 15th meeting, and fifth straight between the two programs, 87-81 at Reese Court. The loss is the third-straight for the Hawks who fall to 3-5 on the season.
 
It was a matchup worthy of two conferences aiming to showcase their hoop talent as the action featured nine tied scores and 15 lead changes. UND held its last lead of the night with 12:20 to play as Kuljuhovic worked a hook shot to give the Hawks a 60-59 advantage. Just over three minutes later, the contest was tied for the final time as sophomore guard Mier Panoam, one of the four Hawks in double figures, nailed a corner three ball to even the contest at 68. Panoam's make was part of a larger UND effort that saw the visitors connect on eight of their ten shots in-between the under-12 and under-8 media timeouts.
 
Yet, the Hawks' journey to the under-4 media was rather cold as UND struggled from the floor amidst a scoring drought of 5:09 which saw the Eagles push out front 80-73. The Hawks pulled to within a point of the deficit in the final two minutes as Eaglestaff hammered a triple from the right wing and then saw Dariyus Woodson, the fourth Hawk in double-figure scoring, clean up an Eaglestaff miss from deep on the ensuing possession with a putback bucket that brought UND to 80-79 of the EWU lead.
 
EWU's lead grew to six and eventually eight as the Eagles' Vice Zanki scored five critical points, including a top-of-the-key three that hit the rim three times, over a 47-second span in the final 1:15 that distanced the host from the Hawks.
 
EWU controlled the boards in the opening twenty minutes with nine offensive rebounds. Both sides made 14 first-half shots and combined for nine made three-point shots which ended with UND leading 42-40 at the intermission.

AGAINST EWU: The Hawks' 50% shooting clip is a season-best effort, and its 81 points are the most against an NCAA opponent this season...UND committed a season-low nine turnovers...Panoam converted a pair of and-1 opportunities during the game to run his season total in the category to a team-leading four...UND made 19 of its 28 free throws, the second-most makes in a game this season along with matching the season-high output in attempts, with Panoam connecting on a season-high six including a pair of instances in which he sank both attempts to tie the contest in the first half...Eaglestaff led UND in scoring for the 40th time in his career, which also marked the 11th time he eclipsed 20 points for the Hawks...Eaglestaff matched his career-high in shot attempts with 19 which he first recorded against Cal St. Fullerton on December 1, 2023...Kuljuhovic finished in double figures for the 20th time in his UND career and matched his UND-high in shot attempts with 11...Woodson matched his UND-best scoring effort with a dozen points as he finished in double figures for the fifth time this season...Panoam's 16 marks the third time in the last four games that the guard has reached 16 points and the sixth time this season he has recorded 10 or more..Kuljuhovic led UND with nine rebounds, including five on the offensive glass, and junior Eli King followed with six...EWU's dozen trifectas as the most allowed by UND this season...The Eagles grabbed an opponent-high 15 offensive rebounds

ROAD HAWKS
Wednesday's matchup against Eastern Washington was the sixth outside the state of North Dakota for the Hawks in eight games this season. UND's meeting with EWU bookended a five-game stretch away from Grand Forks with three of the five standing as true road contests. The Hawks' west coast tip-off against Loyola Marymount marked the first time in program history that UND men's basketball contested in each of the four time zones of the continental United States prior to December.

Including UND's in-state neutral site affair against Dickinson State in Bismarck, the Hawks have flocked nearly 11,000 miles during the first five weeks of the season. Forecasting the remaining travel prior to the New Year has the Hawks totaling over 16,200 during its non-conference slate.  

BIG SKY-SUMMIT CHALLENGE
The Hawks fell to 0-3 in the Big Sky-Summit Challenge with Wednesday's loss at Eastern Washington and will look to pick up the program's first win in the challenge on Saturday against Weber State. A year ago, North Dakota dropped a home contest with Northern Colorado (L, 87-97) and a road tilt at Northern Arizona (L, 73-74) in last season's inaugural matchups. The Summit League won the challenge by 102 points. 

UND is no stranger to the Big Sky having spent six seasons in the league from 2012-13 through 2017-18. The Hawks won 58 league games as a conference member which included the regular season title at 14-4 in 2016-17. That same season, the Hawks won the conference tournament title and received the Big Sky's automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament. 

TIP TOP TREY
Bismarck native Treysen Eaglestaff is the top scorer in the Summit League through the first month of the season. He is averaging 19.1 points per game which rates 41st nationally. His 153 total points are the fourth most in the league and his scoring effort comes behind the fourth-highest field goal percentage among Summit shooters at 45.6%. 

In two games in Cancun, Eaglestaff led UND with 16.5 ppg on 35.7% shooting. He added seven rebounds, two assists and a steal to earn selection to the Cancun Challenge All-Tournament team. 

Eaglestaff has scored in double-figures in all eight games this season crossing over the 20-point mark four times. For his career, Eaglestaff has 43 games in double-figure scoring with 11 games at 20+ points. He facilitates too leading UND with 16 assists.

Thirty-three times in his UND career, Eaglestaff has made no fewer than three three-point shots. He's bottomed three shots from range five times this season. His 19 total three-point makes rank seventh in the Summit League and his 2.38 per game rate second. 

Eaglestaff's effort in wins against Dickinson State and Utah Valley (24.0 ppg, 51.9% FG, 16-of-17 FT, 7 asst., 5 rebs., 1 stl.) earned him the fourth Summit League Peak Performer of the Week award of his career. His 31 points in the win against UVU are the most for Eaglestaff inside the Betty Engelstad Sioux Center and are the most by a Hawk at home since Marlon Stewart went for 35 against North Dakota State (2/22/2020). He was the first Summit League player to reach 30 points in a game this season and his season-high 31 are the second-most in the league this season.

PANOAM, GET TO KNOW HIM
Sophomore transfer guard Mier Panoam is enjoying a solid start to his first season in Grand Forks. The Alaska native has scored in double figures in six of eight games with a season-high 19 points twice in losses to Bethune-Cookman in Cancun and at Eastern Washington.

He leads the team in blocked shots with five, ranks third in rebounding with 5.4 per game and has recorded five or more in six of eight contests and has grabbed seven or more three times. He ranks third on the team in offensive rebounds (14). He has recorded eight assists and seven steals and is one of four Hawks averaging 25 or more minutes per game. 

ELI'S EVERYWHERE
There's plenty to read when it comes to an Eli King stat line. The junior guard has been everywhere and done a little bit of everything for North Dakota in eight games this season.

In 223 minutes, the third-most among Hawks, King is second on the team in offensive rebounds with 15, which included six against Notre Dame, and owns the second-highest rebounding average at 5.6. In his past six games, King has recorded no fewer than five rebounds. He holds a team-high mark in steals (8) and paces UND in offensive fouls drawn this season with seven.

He scored in double figures for the first time this season, and for the tenth time in his career at UND, with ten points in the road win at LMU.

NODAK NOTABLES
*The Hawks hold an offensive rebound rate that is inside the DI top 40 at 37th and leads the Summit League at 13.75. Five Hawks have recorded 13 or more offensive rebounds led by Amar Kuljuhovic's 22 which pushes him over 100 offensive boards in his UND career.
*That effort on the offensive glass has contributed to UND's overall rebounding average of 38.63 which rates second in the Summit League and 100th in Division I. 
*Through eight games, the Hawks employ a scoring defense (74.6) that is fourth among Summit League opposition. 

SCOUTING THE WILDCATS
Weber State comes to Grand Forks at 4-5 overall and is coming off of a four-point home loss to North Dakota State on Wednesday in the Big Sky-Summit Challenge. WSU owns wins over Division I programs Pepperdine and Bowling Green as well as Northwest Indian College and Justice College.

The Wildcats won 20 games a season ago and finished fourth in the Big Sky regular season standings. WSU received a first-place vote and was tabbed to a fourth place finish in this year's preseason coaches poll. In the league's media poll, Weber State was voted third behind seven first-place votes. 

Weber State is under the leadership of third-year head coach Eric Duft who led the Wildcats to 18 wins in 2022-23 and twenty last season. It is his 19th year overall on the Weber State coaching staff after spending 16 as an assistant to longtime WSU head coach Randy Rahe. 

WSU ranks 58th in DI in defensive rebounds per game (27.89) which rates second in the Big Sky. The team's overall board-grabbing rate of 39.11 ranks 85th nationally. The Wildcats are defending at a 40.2% rate which ranks 73rd nationally. WSU attempts the three ball at a top 100 mark nationally of 25.6 per game. It's 9.1 makes per outing rank 82nd. Overall, the Wildcats protect the basketball turning it over at just 10.4 times per game; a mark that ranks inside the top 60 in the country. 

Blaise Threatt's 23 steals in nine games ranks ninth in DI and his per game rate of 2.56 ranks 26th. Threatt's 3.50 assist-to-turnover ratio leads the Big Sky and ranks 27th in Division I. Threatt's 42 assists are a top 60 mark nationally. He is the Wildcats' top scorer averaging 17.3 ppg behind 63 made field goals which ranks inside the top 30 nationally. Miguel Tomley (11.2 ppg) and Dyson Koehler (10.2 ppg) both follow with double-figure scoring averages. 

Both Tomley and Viljami Vartianinen each have made 21 three-point shots. Tomley's 39.6% clip from three leads all Wildcats with 20 or more attempts from beyond-the-arc. Koehler paces the rebounding effort with 6.3 per game, Threatt follows with 5.3 and Nigel Burris adds 5.0. Alex Tow averages 1.3 blocks per game.

UND BY THE NUMBERS
110- The number of points needed by junior guard Treysen Eaglestaff to reach 1,000 for his career. The Bismarck native would be the 39th player in program history to reach the mark and the 12th player in the program's DI era to accomplish the scoring feat.
53- The combined number of rebounds and steals from junior guard Eli King this season. King owns UND's single-game highs this season in rebounds (9) and steals (3). He leads in total steals (8) and ranks second in total rebounds (45).
19.1- Junior guard Treysen Eaglestaff's ppg through eight games this season. The average leads all Summit League players and ranks 41st in the country. He is one of three players in the league with a 30-point game this season and was the first to reach the mark.
15- The number of points needed by senior forward Amar Kuljuhovic to reach 1,000 for his collegiate career. The Waterloo, Iowa native scored 624 points in two seasons at Lake Land College and enters this weekend with 361 as a Fighting Hawk. 
8- The current placement on UND's career three-pointers made list for junior guard Treysen Eaglestaff who has netted 156 trifectas. He is second in made three-point attempts among Hawks who played their entire career at the DI level. Earlier this season, he moved past Troy Huff (141), Tom Jacobson (146) and Aaron Anderson (147) on the list and is 29 away from fifth all-time.

A UND WIN WOULD
» Snap a three-game losing streak
» Give the Hawks a 2-0 start at home against DI opponents for the first time under Sather
» Be the 36th for the Hawks at home under Sather
» Be the sixth for UND against Weber State
» Be better than a loss