Wyoming Tips League Play Thursday at UNLV
Seventh-straight season Cowgirls open MW play on the road
LARAMIE, Wyo. (Dec. 27, 2022) – The Wyoming Cowgirl basketball team opens Mountain West play with a tall task Thursday night at defending league champion, UNLV. The Cowgirls and Lady Rebels tip off at 7:30 p.m., Mountain Time.
Thursday’s game will be broadcast live on the Mountain West Network and can be heard across the Cowgirl Radio Network with David Settle on the call. Wyoming is opening league play on the road for the seventh consecutive season.
ABOUT THE COWGIRLS
Wyoming (7-4) closed its non-conference slate last week with a 61-56 road victory at Wichita State. The trio of Grace Ellis, Allyson Fertig and Quinn Weidemann led the Cowgirls with a combined 41 points, 15 made field goals and seven 3-pointers. Fertig recorded her third double-double of the season with 16 points and 18 rebounds and was a force defensively, tying a career-high with four blocks and recording a career-best with four steals. Ellis and Weidemann, meanwhile, went 6-for-8 combined from beyond-the-arc in the win. Ellis hit a trio of 3-pointers in the game’s final five minutes while Fertig and Weidemann added another nine points combined in the fourth quarter as the trio scored 18 of Wyoming’s 21 points in the game’s final 10 minutes.
Weidemann continues to lead the Cowgirls in scoring at 12.7 points per game while her 44.6-percent shooting from 3-point range and 2.3 made 3-pointers per game both rank third in the Mountain West. Weidemann also leads UW with 27 assists and is second with nine steals. Ellis, meanwhile, is averaging 10 points a contest in 2022-23 and is shooting 53-percent from the floor and 14-of-26 from 3-point range. Fertig enters league play nearly tallying a double-double a game as she is recording 9.9 points and 9.6 rebounds per contest.
The Cowgirls have been sensational defensively this season, leading the league in opponent 3-point percentage (25.9-percent) and is second in opponent field goal percentage (36-percent) and scoring defense (53.2). The 53.2 points per game allowed, ranks 14th in the country thus far. UW also ranks second in the MW committing just 13.5 fouls per contest and is third with a 1.12 assist-to-turnover ratio and a plus-2.4 rebounding margin.
SCOUTING UNLV
The defending Mountain West regular season and tournament champions enter the conference-opener at 10-2 overall and is 8-0 at home this season. Reigning Mountain West Player of the Year, Desi-Rae Young, leads the Lady Rebels averaging 18.6 points and 9.8 rebounds per game this season and is shooting nearly 61-percent from the floor. Nneka Obiazor is second on the team averaging 12.4 points per game while Essence Booker is scoring at an 11.9-point per game clip and leads the team with 44 assists.
As a team, the Lady Rebels are averaging 78 points per game and allowing opponents to score just over 65 a contest. UNLV is shooting almost 44-percent overall as a team and is hitting 29.5-percent from 3-point range. UNLV also out-rebounds its opponents by nearly nine boards per contest. Lady Rebel opponents are also averaging 17 turnovers per contest. Las Vegas native, Lindy La Rocque, is in her third season as the head coach of the Lady Rebels. La Rocque was the 2020-21 MW Coach of the Year.
SERIES HISTORY AGAINST UNLV
Wyoming leads the all-time series, 28-26 against the Lady Rebels and is 8-18 in Vegas in the series. Last season, the two squads split both meetings, with each winning at home. The Cowgirls are 6-4 against UNLV in the last 10 meetings in the series. In eight career games against the Lady Rebels, Weidemann is averaging 12.5 points per game and is shooting nearly 49-percent from 3-point range and has hit 18-of-19 from the free-throw line. Fertig, meanwhile, averaged a double-double with 10 points and 11 rebounds last year against UNLV.
