THE OPENING TIP
The No. 13 UMD women's basketball team (15-2 overall, 12-0 NSIC) sets out on its second road trip of the new year this weekend with a two-state swing of NSIC competition. The Bulldogs first head to South Dakota to take on Sioux Falls on Friday, Jan. 20 at 7:30 p.m. before making it back to Minnesota to play SMSU in Marshall on Saturday, Jan. 21 at 5:30 p.m. Along the way, UMD will look to defend what has blossomed into an 11-game win streak dating back to Dec. 1.
LAST TIME OUT
Week after week after week, it's becoming harder and harder to see this UMD team as anything other than the cream of the crop in the NSIC.
In truth, any semblance of doubt should have flown out the window after the Bulldogs' road win against then-No. 5 Minnesota State two weeks ago. But perhaps there were few who remained who wanted some kind of "prove it" weekend. Well…
It all started with Upper Iowa coming to town last Friday. Credit to the Peacocks- they hung in there for much of the early stages of the contest. UMD led after 10 minutes, but only by four at a score of 18-14. And by the 6:58 mark, the game was all knotted up at 22 apiece. It'd been a noble effort- but you can only contain these Bulldogs for so long. From that 22-all mark until halftime, UMD outscored Upper Iowa 16-6, leaving the score at 38-28.
The break did little to cool the Bulldogs down. Of course, it helps when you have Brooke Olson on your team. By this stage in the contest, Olson was just 15 points shy of hitting the 2000 mark for her storied career. It took her just over two and a half minutes of the third quarter to trim that difference down to eight. The graduate guard scored UMD's first seven points of the frame to bring its lead to 13 at a score of 45-32.
At precisely the 5:47 mark of period three, the Bulldogs started to bust down the doors of this game for good. A Maesyn Thiesen Bucket pushed UMD's lead back up to 12 at 48-36. Nobody would know it then, but this would be the start of a 14-4 Bulldog run that would balloon their lead all the way up to 20 at a score of 60-40.
Why not cap off a game-sealing hot streak with some history? Just under two minutes into the final frame, Olson sank a tough shot through contact to drag the score to 66-42, her team's advantage out to 14. Standard-issue Olson bucket- only this one doubled as her ticket to the 2K club. Just like that, the graduate forward became just one of three players in all of UMD women's basketball history to amass two millennia worth of scoring.
It seemed like just about everything had started coming up aces for UMD- and that trend certainly continued. When the dust settled from Friday's contest, UMD emerged as the overwhelming Victor by a score of 76-48. The Bulldogs had outscored the Peacocks 16-8. All things considered, UMD actually outscored Upper Iowa in every single period.
Naturally, it was Olson that would end the night as the team's leading scorer. She tallied 30 points on 11-18 shooting from the field (4-6 from deep) to go with seven rebounds.
Second verse, same as the first- for the most part. The formula of UMD's victory over Winona State on Saturday was a touch different than the one they'd employed on Friday. The Bulldogs didn't have much interest in letting things stay close for very long at all against the Warriors- instead, UMD took an all-but insurmountable 37-16 lead with it into halftime. It sure helped that the Bulldogs were able to hold Winona to a whopping three total points scored in the second quarter while UMD put up 16 on the offensive end. It was another of a string of "one of those nights" for the Bulldogs, and the fun didn't stop in the third frame. There, UMD outscored the Warriors 17-8. Heading into the fourth, the Bulldogs were already up by 30 at a score of 54-24. That made surviving a late 16-12 Warriors surge throughout the final 10 minutes a bit more of a manageable task. Another day, another W- UMD left Saturday with a 66-40 victory.
Olson wasn't satiated by hitting the 2000 touchstone the day before. She led the team in scoring once again on Saturday with 14 points on precise 7-8 shooting from the field. This time around, she grabbed eight boards. Needless to say, it was a pretty nice weekend for Olson. It tracks pretty easily, then, that it was a nice weekend for UMD at-large- those two things are often going to align.
RANKINGS ROUNDUP
Once again, UMD found itself on the rise throughout the rankings world this week. The Bulldogs jumped from No. 15 to No. 13 in the latest WBCA Coaches Poll, now sitting just two spots shy of topping their most recent high of No. 12 in the second-to-last poll of the 2021-22 season. UMD bumped up three spots from No. 14 to No. 11 in the newest D2SIDA Media Poll. The Bulldogs stood firm at No. 2 in the D2SIDA's Regional Rankings. The team ahead of them, Central Missouri, isn't just touted as the top team in the Central Region- it's No. 2 in the entire country.
STATS STATUS REPORT
Olson finds herself at the top of the pack in a few key stats for the Bulldogs. The graduate forward's 18.9 points per game mark doesn't just lead the team- it's the 24th best scoring figure in the nation. She's doing it at a shooting percentage of 50.4% from the field, too. And when Olson isn't scoring, she's finding plenty of other ways to get involved. The forward also has team-highs in rebounds per game (7.1) and blocks per game (1.2).
Another important factor on the scoring scene has been Ella Gilbertson. The junior guard is UMD's other double-digit point-getter at this stage of the season, averaging 10.9 points a night. She herself has been pretty efficient in the process, holding a field goal percentage of 49.2%. Gilbertson doesn't lose much of a step from beyond the arc- she's shooting 42.1% from three-point land. She joins Kaylee Nelson (who's working at a 42.3% shooting clip from three) to form UMD's own Splash Bros combo.
Two players have been particularly important in getting these offensive efforts off the ground. One is Thiesen, who's averaging a team-high 3.5 assists per game. The other? Taya Hakamaki. If UMD doesn't already have possession, the junior guard's pretty good at finding ways to establish it. Hakamaki's averaging 2.1 steals a game right now.
As a team, UMD has continued to maintain its stature as a nationally touted defensive unit. In fact, the Bulldogs just keep climbing the ranks. UMD is holding opponents to just 54.3 points a game right now, which pushes it into the top 10 nationally in that regard at nine. It's the best mark in the NSIC. One of the things that makes this Bulldogs group so scary is that they're able to d-up like this while bringing a similar intensity on the offensive end of the floor. UMD's team shooting percentage? That's at 44.9%. It's the 19th highest mark in all the land, the second-best in the conference. That's quite a one-two punch.
NINE DIMES AWAY
With five more assists added to her name over this past weekend, Thiesen sits just nine away from hitting 430 for her career. That tally would be good enough for her to hop onto the podium of the top five passers in UMD history, surpassing Sammy Kozlowski's mark of 429.
THE RHOADE TO 500
Rhoades scored 14 points over the weekend, bringing her total to 455 across three seasons and change at UMD. With just 45 more tallies, the senior guard will have potted half a millenium's worth of points as a Bulldog.
SCOUTING REPORT ON SIOUX FALLS (6-12 OVERALL, 3-9 NSIC)
CRAFTING THE COUGARS
Sioux Falls has never known life in the NCAA Division II ranks without Travis Traphagen at the helm.
After the 2010-11 season, the Cougars left their former home of the NAIA's GPAC in preparation for a jump to the NSIC. By this point, Traphagen had already been with the club for three years, amassing an overall record of 63-34 (.649 winning percentage) in that span. He saw to it that Sioux Falls exited its long-time home with a bang, guiding the Cougars to a 27-6 record in 2010-11 that included the team's first appearance in the NAIA Tournament since 2003. And it wasn't just a cup-of-coffee stop for Sioux Falls- they made it all the way to the Elite Eight.
Now, Traphagen had the unique task of helping his team acclimate into an entirely new space.
2011-12 was, quite literally, a year of transition. Sioux Falls would play out the year as Independent, needing to wait until 2012-13 to become a fully decorated member of the NSIC. This isn't to say that the Cougars didn't get an early taste of what was to come- the vast majority of that 2011-12 slate consisted of matchups with NSIC foes. Right off the bat, Traphagen and company provided reason for optimism for what was to come. Sioux Falls went 23-3 in their year of independence, losing just one game to NSIC competition along the way.
The Cougars wouldn't quite match that kind of mark in their first two seasons as a true conference member. Sioux Falls' inaugural NSIC effort would see the team finish 12-15 overall and 9-13 in-conference. The 2013-14 season would work out similarly, the Cougars going 14-15 on the year and 8-14 in NSIC games. They would go on to post their first two wins in the NSIC Tournament that season, though.
Then came 2014-2015. It wasn't quite on par with their efforts as an NCAA Independent, but it was no doubt the Cougars' best conference offering yet. Sioux Falls went 17-10 that year and finished above water in NSIC play with a 13-9 in-conference mark. It was a season that ended with a first round exit in the NSIC Tournament, but it was still something to build on.
And build, Traphagen and the team did.
That 17-10 effort set a winning precedent that Sioux Falls hasn't failed to reach since. Generally, it hasn't even been a sweat for the Cougars to finish a season in the green. Sioux Falls has closed four of the last seven seasons since 2014-15 with 20+ wins. All-told, even with those first two years of acclimation, the Cougars have gone 187-111 (.628 winning percentage) across 10 seasons and change in the NSIC. Along the way, Traphagen and the gang have added an NSIC South Division Title (2019-20) and NSIC Tournament gold (2015-16) to the trophy case.
2021-22 IN A NUTSHELL
Last season was a decent return to form for Sioux Falls after what was a bizarre 2020-21 season for the entire league due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The Cougars went 16-12 in 2021-22, posting an in-conference mark of 11-9. This landed the squad at third in the NSIC South and fifth in the conference overall. The Cougars' chances of extending their season were cut short by way of a 62-55 upset at the hands of Mary in the first round of the NSIC Tournament.
SOPHOMORE SURGES
It's been an uncharacteristic start for Traphagen's Sioux Falls club so far this year. A 6-12 overall record paired with a 3-9 mark in NSIC play has left the Cougars with quite a hole to dig themselves out of in the latter half of the season to avoid their first losing effort since 2013-14.
Despite all of this, there's plenty of reason for optimism in South Dakota.
Let's look at the list of the team's scoring leaders, shall we? Along the way, you'll see the name Olivia Gamoke. The guard showed promise in what was her freshman effort last year, averaging 6.5 points to go along with a notable 2.3 assists and 2.3 rebounds a night. She's taken quite a stride as a sophomore, now averaging double-figures at 10.1 points a night. Okay, perhaps saying "along the way" was a little misleading- Gamoke's currently tied for the team lead in scoring in just her second stint with the group.
And the guard isn't just chucking up Hail Marys to hit that total- in fact, she's been a sniper from beyond the arc. Gamoke's working at a clip of 40.4% from three so far this season. And she certainly hasn't neglected the other aspects of her game in the midst of this scoring surge- in fact, her numbers elsewhere have also improved. Gamoke averages a team-high 2.5 assists a night while grabbing 4 rebounds a contest, too.
Who joins this sophomore sensation at the top of Sioux Falls' scoring charts? Well… another sophomore.
Enter Brecli Honner. Honner also put up a respectable statline across her first year in the collegiate space, averaging 4.3 points to go along with 2.9 rebounds a game. This season, the guard's scoring touch has evolved in just about every measurable way. She's jumped up to a points per game clip of 10.1 a night, exactly a six-point improvement- and she's doing it with hyper-efficiency. Honner's currently operating at a clip of 50.7% from the field despite the uptick in offensive usage. All-the-same, the guard has also improved under the glass in other ways. Honner's bumped her boards per game number up to 4.1.
And you can't go without mentioning Megan Fannin. The guard may be a sophomore of a redshirt variety rather than the true sophomores mentioned above, but hey, it'll work out the same way. Fannin was a force for the Cougars last year, averaging a team-high 12.9 points a contest while bringing in 3 boards a game, too. It's been a slower start for the guard so far this year, but she's still averaging a 9.1 PPG mark through 15 games played that's good for third on the team. Certainly a player for the Bulldogs to keep an eye on.
SCOUTING REPORT ON SMSU (11-6 OVERALL, 8-4 NSIC)
COACHING CONVO
The year was 2016, and there was a serious need for a makeover in Marshall.
SMSU hadn't posted a winning record since 2009-10. Scratch that- the Mustangs hadn't crossed double-digit wins in that six-season span. A program that had entered the millennium as a true 20-win force was now struggling to fully establish its footing.
Enter Tom Webb. Webb was coming off of an eight-year coaching tenure with fellow-DII member Cameron out in Oklahoma. His overall record of 91-123 (.425 winning percentage) deserves a deeper dive. Webb left that program as the winningest coach in its history. He led Cameron to double-digit victories in five of his eight outings. In fact, he had just guided the Aggies to two-consecutive winning campaigns between 2014-16. Webb had proven that he was capable of being a winner- that's what SMSU desperately needed.
But if Rome wasn't built in a day, Marshall wouldn't be, either. The first few seasons of the Webb era can now be looked back upon as a period of necessary growing pains. The team would continue its streak of closing the season with just a single digit in the win column between 2016-18. Then came the 2018-19 campaign. The Mustangs still weren't quite able to bust through the .500 mark- they'd finish 12-16 that season. Even still, this was SMSU's first time with this kind of win tally in nearly a decade. That gave Webb and company something to build off of.
As it turns out, this was one fine group of architects.
The very next season, the Mustangs flip-flopped their record from the year prior, going 16-12. It was the first winning year they'd seen since that same 2009-10 boogeyman of a season that had once been their last outing with a winning record. Things wouldn't end the way the Mustangs hoped, as they'd ultimately fall to Mary in the first round of the NSIC Tournament and fail to qualify for the NCAA Tourney. Still, tremendous progress had been made.
Then… the COVID-19 pandemic happened.
As mentioned with Sioux Falls, the 2020-21 season was abnormal for all that were involved in it. Still, SMSU managed to leave it with yet another winning campaign under its belt, closing with a 9-5 record. The Mustangs' brief NSIC Tournament streak would come to an end here, though, as they'd lose a win-and-you're-in OT battle with Sioux Falls in the final game of the regular season to fall as short as a team can come from postseason play. Once again, though, there was a silver lining to be found.
2021-22 IN A NUTSHELL
Admittedly, though, SMSU's 2021-22 effort was rather carbon neutral. Webb and company were able to keep their heads above water, but they didn't much explore the stars.
The Mustangs went exactly 13-13 overall last year, finishing with a 9-11 mark in NSIC action. This was still good enough to push SMSU into the NSIC Tournament by the season's end- and the team wouldn't take the opportunity for granted. The Mustangs proceeded to win the program's first conference tournament contest since 2003, defeating MSU Moorhead 71-67. The second round would end up being the end of the road for SMSU, but it certainly had something to show for its run.
Let's keep the positivity train going. Perhaps it wasn't an above .500 effort, but it sure wasn't a below .500 mark, either. That officially made it three-straight seasons without a losing record for SMSU. The Mustangs hadn't experienced a stretch like this before this one since 1999-2002. Clearly, something Webb's been doing has been working.
ON TO GREENER PASTURES
But it looked as if it might be a bit of an uphill battle for SMSU to be able to keep this new-fabled streak afloat. Two key Mustangs from the 2021-22 effort had graduated over the summer. One was Meleah Reinhart, who had led SMSU in scoring with 14.9 points a night while also averaging five rebounds a game (third on the team). Fellow newfound-graduate Sadie Skeeter hadn't been all that far behind in the scoring department, finishing at second on the team charts with 13.3 points a game. She closed as this class' strongest rebounder, though, averaging a clip of 5.4 boards a night in her senior swansong that was good for second on the team.
SOPH-MORES
In the face of these losses, the Mustangs turned to a force that is a bit of a crapshoot for help: development.
Development is a tricky thing. It never looks the same from player to player- one size most certainly does not fit all. Sometimes, growth just never happens at all. All you can do is keep rolling the dice.
Boy, what a result the Mustangs have ended up with so far this year in this department.
Look at a player like Hannah Parsley. As a freshman last season, Parsley averaged 3.7 points and 2.5 rebounds a game. Remember to keep things relative- all things considered, this can be seen as a pretty standard freshman outing. What is perhaps a little bit less standard-issue? The jump Parsley has made in year two. Try a near-exact nine point bump in scoring production to 12.7 points a game. While we're at it, why not double that rebounding tally? Parsley's grabbing 5.4 boards a game now. And did we forget to mention that that 12.7 mark is coming on 50.6% shooting from the field? Or that, through all of this, Parsley's also snagging two steals a game?
It's safe to call this kind of development rapid. Let's see one more example to really affirm what that looks like.
Enter Bri Stoltzmann. Stoltzmann was also just a freshman last year. She, too, had a pretty prototypical first-season outing. The guard averaged 2.6 points a game. That came on 51.9% shooting from the field, which is impressive, but the sample size was quite limited. Stoltzmann paired her scoring with 2.5 rebounds a night. Yep, sounds like a freshman.
Let's read off Stoltzmann's numbers so far this year:
-a team-high 13.4 points a game on 53.7% (!!) shooting from the field
-6.4 boards a night (leads the team)
-2.4 assists a game (second on the team)
Does this sound like the kind of sophomore outing you'd expect from those earlier numbers just a year before? Well, forget whether or not you believe it- Stoltzmann's really doing it.
UPPERCLASSMUSTANGS
It hasn't just been this pair of super-sophomores against the world, though. Two upperclassmen have also been pivotal in SMSU's early success.
Take Sam Wall, for example. Speaking of examples, Wall also works as another listing for our discussion of marked improvement between seasons. As a sophomore last year, the guard averaged 7.7 points a game. Throughout the first half of her junior campaign, she's bumped that up by five, working at a rate of 12.7 points a contest. That's good for second on the team.
The hits just keep on coming with Jenna Borchers. Borchers offered a reliable punch of scoring and passing as a junior, potting 7.5 points a game along with 2.04 assists. That assist tally has bumped up by about a nickel a night to 2.54 this season, which leads the team. The scoring average? That's jumped up by five points on-the-dot. Borchers is fourth on the team in scoring- the final Mustang to be averaging double-digits- with 12.5 points a night.
SHOOTING STARS
Lots and lots of talking about scoring with this Mustangs group- let's keep it going, shall we?
As if that fab four wasn't enough of an indication, this SMSU squad has a knack for putting the ball in the basket. The group is 22nd in the nation (third in the NSIC) in scoring offense with 76.2 points a night, which should come as little surprise. The scariest part of that truth is another fact that pairs with it- the Mustangs do all of this scoring with efficiency. SMSU is 32nd in the country (also third in the conference) in overall field goal percentage at 44.1%. Okay, there's a third scary thing, too- the Mustangs' work from behind the arc. It's enough that SMSU is tied for 28th nationally (and alone at first in the NSIC) in three-point attempts at 25.3 a game. It's a different issue that the Mustangs are tied for 10th in the country in three-pointers made with 9.2 a game, which also sits atop the NSIC. It gets pretty diabolical to see the resulting 36.3% three-point shooting percentage- that's 22nd in the nation and best in the NSIC.
Saturday's matchup, then, offers about as much as you could ever ask for out of a game of basketball- a highly-touted defense in UMD stacking up against an explosive SMSU offensive attack. One of these forces is going to have to win out- can't just be a stalemate.
THE BROADCAST
Follow along with UMD's road trip by catching both games live through the links below:
vs Sioux Falls (Friday, Jan. 20 @ 7:30 p.m.): bit.ly/3CYGJs2
vs SMSU (Saturday, Jan. 21 @ 5:30 p.m.): bit.ly/3wgYCys
UP NEXT
The Bulldogs return home to Romano next weekend for two more fresh NSIC tests. UMD first squares up against Wayne State College on Friday, Jan. 27 at 7:30 p.m. before taking on Augustana on Saturday, Jan. 28 at 5:30 p.m.
