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ST. PAUL, Minn. - The Concordia Golden Bears women's basketball team (11-4, 6-2 NSIC) look to ride the momentum of last weekend's sweep as they head to MSU Moorhead (8-4, 4-4 NSIC) and Northern State (10-2, 6-2 NSIC) this weekend. Tip-off on Friday is set for 6 p.m. while Saturday is set to tip at 5 p.m.
THE MATCH-UP... The Golden Bears are 23-10 all-time against the Dragons and have gone 7-5 in Moorhead. CU has won their last three meetings on the road against MSUM and five of the last six overall.
Northern State holds 17-13 advantage in the 30 meetings between the two schools. CU is 4-8 in 12 trips to Aberdeen. The Wolves have gone 6-4 in the last 10 meetings.
LAST YEAR VS MSUM... MSU Moorhead went into the half clinging to a 31-27 lead, but the Golden Bears closed the margin coming out of halftime taking a one point lead 36-35 with 17:00 left in the second half on a made layup for Whiting. The Dragons were able to tie the game back up at 44 with 13:19 left in the game but it was all Golden Bears from there as CU led the rest of the way in a 76-70 win.
Concordia's second half surge was led by Whiting as she turned in 20 of her 24 points in the second half on 7-of-11 shooting from the field.
Rachel Hansen dished out eight assists, adding seven rebounds.
LAST YEAR VS NSU... Concordia advanced to the NSIC/Sanford Health Tournament semifinals with an 80-65 win over Northern State back on March 2nd, 2013. The Golden Bears came out firing, hitting their first six shots and nine of their first 12 to jump out to a 21-9 lead in the opening nine minutes of the first half. Northern State clawed their way back into the game with a 13-2 run, cutting the Concordia lead to one at 24-23. They eventually pulled even at 28 with just over four minutes remaining in the half. CU responded with a 12-1 run to finish with a double digit lead at 40-29 at the break.
NSU made a quick 6-0 run a few minutes into the second half that cut the Concordia lead to seven at 45-38, but
Amanda Barton responded with a three to push the lead back to double digits. The lead never fell below 10 for the rest of the night. Concordia went 4-4 from distance during a four and half minute period in the middle of the second half which stretched the lead to 68-49 and effectively put the game out of hand.
Anika Whiting finshed the night with a team-high 19 points and was an efficient 7-11 from the field.
Rachel Hansen filled up the stat sheet with 16 points, six assists, four rebounds and two steals.
LAST TIME OUT... Concordia picked up a weekend sweep against two upper echelon NSIC North teams in Minnesota Duluth and St. Cloud State. On Friday against the Bulldogs the offense was clicking all night long as the Golden Bears easily set a new season high with 95 points in a 95-63 win. The 95 points were the most in a game for CU since a 108-74 win over U-Mary on February 18th, 2011. The Golden Bears went into the half shooting 48.4% and improved that number to 54.3% in the second half. They finished the game an impressive 35-68 (51.5%) from the floor, their best mark on the year. Concordia also set a season high with 28 assists on their 35 makes and tied a season high with nine threes made. On Saturday, Concordia once again seemed to hit everything as they made 57.7% of their shots in the first half. They led from start to finish and turned away every comeback attempt as they pulled out a 67-61 win.
TAKING CARE OF THE ROCK... The Golden Bears have been one of the best teams in the country in terms of taking care of the basketball. CU leads the nation in fewest turnovers per game at 11.5 and ranks fourth in assist-to-turnover ratio at 1.36.
Rachel Hansen has been a big factor in that assist-to-turnover ratio as she ranks 23rd in the country and first in the NSIC with 5.1 assists per game.
