University of Minnesota Athletics
Gophers Head To Northwestern on Monday
2/23/2009 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Game 27
Minnesota Golden Gophers (18-8, 10-5)
vs.
Northwestern Wildcats (6-20, 2-13)
LOCATION Welsh-Ryan Arena / Evanston, Ill.
DATE / TIME: Monday, Feb. 23 / 7 p.m.
TELEVISION: Big Ten Network
Mark Neely (Play-by-play), Mary Murphy (Color Analyst)
RADIO / WEBCAST: KBEM 88.5 FM / Gopher Radio Network / gophersports.com
Corbu Stathes (Play-by-play), Lynnette Sjoquist (Color Analyst)
Golden Gopher Watch List Feb. 23, 2009
Golden Gophers Head to Northwestern on Monday - Minnesota enters a week with back-to-back road games, the first of them on Monday, Feb. 23, when the Golden Gophers travel to Northwestern. Tipoff is set for 7 p.m.
Note Time Changes For Upcoming Games - Minnesota’s Feb. 26 game at Michigan State will be a 7 p.m. ET (6 p.m. CT) tip, while the home game on March 1 versus Illinois will begin at 1 p.m. Both games will be streamed live on bigtennetwork.com.
Longest Conference Winning Streak in Minnesota History - The Gophers extended their winning streak over Northwestern to 16 games on Jan. 25 with a 43-40 victory. The 16-game winning streak is Minnesota’s longest over a Big Ten opponent.
Fox Moves Up Career Scoring List - Emily Fox scored 18 points in the loss to Ohio State to move into No. 9 on the Minnesota all-time scoring list with 1,361 points. She is three points from the No. 8 spot.
Gophers Face Important Road Game
Minnesota enters a week with back-to-back road games, the first of them on Monday, Feb. 23, when the Golden Gophers travel to Northwestern. Tipoff is set for 7 p.m. The Gophers sport a record of 18-8 overall and 10-5 in Big Ten play after dropping a 73-62 decision to Conference co-leader Ohio State last Thursday. Minnesota then heads to Michigan State on Thursday (Feb. 26) before ending the regular season with a home contest versus Illinois (March 1). Northwestern has struggled to a 6-20 overall record, 2-13 in league action.
Minnesota / Northwestern Game on BTN
The Gophers’ game versus Northwestern is the featured Monday night game on the Big Ten Network. Calling the action will be Mark Neely and Mary Murphy. The Northwestern game will be the Gophers’ final television appearance of the regular season. Minnesota’s final two games will be video streamed live on bigtennetwork.com.
Tip Times Confirmed For Gophers’ Final Two Games
The Big Ten announced the starting times and media coverage for the games in the final week of the Conference season. Minnesota’s Feb. 26 game at Michigan State will be a 7 p.m. ET (6 p.m. CT) tip, while the home game on March 1 versus Illinois will begin at 1 p.m. Both games will be streamed live on bigtennetwork.com.
Looking To Extend The Streak
The Gophers extended their winning streak over Northwestern to 16 games on Jan. 25 with a 43-40 victory. The 16-game winning streak is Minnesota’s longest over a Big Ten opponent. The next longest winning streak against a Big Ten team is eight games and was compiled four times, once against Iowa, Michigan, Purdue and Wisconsin. The last of those streaks, however, ended in 1986.
A Lot at Stake
Though there are teams, including Minnesota, that are not mathematically eliminated from winning the Big Ten title, with three rounds of play remaining the race seems to have come down to a three-team race. Even accepting that reality, the Golden Gophers still have plenty to play for. The first order of business is wrapping up one of the Big Ten Tournament first-round bye awarded to the top five teams in the Conference standings. After that teams will be looking to bolster their NCAA Tournament resumes. Following is the remaining games for the top six teams in the Big Ten.
Michigan State (12-3)
Feb. 22 at Wisconsin
Feb. 26 vs. Minnesota
March 1 vs. Purdue
Ohio State (12-3)
Feb. 22 at Indiana
Feb. 26 vs. Wisconsin
March 1 vs. Penn State
Purdue (12-4)
Feb. 26 vs. Michigan
March 1 at Michigan State
Minnesota (10-5)
Feb. 23 at Northwestern
Feb. 26 at Michigan State
March 1 vs. Illinois
Iowa (10-5)
Feb. 22 at Michigan
Feb. 26 vs. Illinois
March 1 at Northwestern
Indiana (10-6)
Feb. 22 vs. Ohio State
March 1 vs. Michigan
Gophers Are Winning The Close Ones
Good teams find a way to make plays in the closing minutes to win games. Minnesota has made the big plays in the last four minutes and its 10-5 Big Ten record certainly reflects it. The Gophers are 7-0 in Big Ten games decided by six or less points.
Fox Moves Up To No. 9, Soon No. 8
Emily Fox joined the top 10 of the Gophers’ all-time leading scorers list in the game on Feb. 15 at Michigan, her 117th career game in a Gopher uniform. In her next game (Feb. 19 versus Ohio State), Fox scored 18 and climbed into the No. 9 spot. She now has 1,361 career points and should jump into No. 8 in Monday’s game at Northwestern. Fox needs only three points to surpass Deb Hunter (1979-83) with 1,363 points. The No. 7 spot is held by Carol Peterka (1982-86) with 1,441 points.
Fox also recently became the eighth player in Minnesota history to score 100 three-point field goals, hitting the trey to get her triple digits in the Iowa (2-8) game. She currently has 105 career three-pointers.
Fundamental Forces At Work
Minnesota has been out-rebounded in seven of its last eight games. Especially in a season where points and even possessions come at a premium, rebounding is a major focus for the Gophers down the homestretch of the season. Despite being out-rebounded by an average of over six rebounds in the last eight games and having team’s average of 11.4 offensive rebounds per game over that span, Minnesota has only given up just 9.4 second-chance points per game.
Let the Countdown Begin
Gopher junior Ashley Ellis-Milan has played the best basketball of her collegiate career this season. Not only is she a solid candidate for All-Big Ten honors, Ellis-Milan is also nearing the 1,000 career points milestone. She is averaging 10.2 points per game over her career and currently has scored 925 points as a Golden Gophers. Ellis-Milan also has 664 career rebounds.
Looking on the Bright Side
One of the bright spots of the loss to Ohio State was the play of Brittany McCoy. McCoy turned in one of her finest performances of her Gopher career contributing 12 points, five assists, four steals and three rebounds.
Charity Accepted, Just Not Offered of Late
The effectiveness of the Minnesota offense is improved drastically when the Gophers get to the free throw line. The Gophers have just attempted 22 free throws in their last three games. In the last four Gopher losses in Big Ten play, Minnesota managed to reach the free throw line just 8.5 times per game. The Gophers did get to the line in their loss at Wisconsin, 25 times in fact, they just didn’t covert making just 14.
A Win is a Win
The Gophers’ last outing versus Northwestern wasn’t pretty,,but most importantly, it was a victory. The low-scoring 43-40 outcome made it necessary to do some research into the record books.
The 43 points scored by the Gophers was the lowest winning total in 35 years. The combined total of 83 (Minnesota, 43 Northwestern 40) was the lowest combined score in the NCAA era for Minnesota. The previous low was 94 points, which occurred twice, the last being a 63-31 Gopher loss at Purdue on Feb. 12, 2005. The previous combined scored at home in Williams Arena was 97 points when Minnesota defeated St. Francis, 64-33, on March 19, 2005 in the first round of the NCAA Tournament.
The 40 points allowed is the lowest this season and the lowest point total scored against the Gophers since Chicago State managed just 34 points in a 72-34 loss in Williams Arena on Dec. 2, 2006. The total is the lowest the Gophers have allowed in Big Ten since Northwestern scored just 33 points (71-33) in Williams Arena in the regular-season finale of the 2005-06 season.
McCoy Notches Third Season With 100+ Assists
Brittany McCoy added the 2008-09 as her third consecutive season with 100 or more assists and currently has 109 on the season. McCoy’s average of 4.2 dishes a game, which ranks third in the Big Ten. The Gopher junior was already the only player in school history to dish out 100 or more assists as both a freshman and sophomore and now she adds her junior season to the list.
Fox Also Hits Century Assists Mark
Emily Fox has 104 assists on the season as she joined Brittany McCoy with 100 or more assists this season. The duo both collected their 100th assist of the 2008-09 season in the win at Michigan (2/15). Fox and McCoy share the honor of being one of just two sets of Minnesota teammates (Janel McCarville/April Calhoun, 2004-05) to tally triple assist totals in the same season. The Fox and McCoy tandem now accomplished the last three seasons.
Defense, Defense and More Defense
The Big Ten is known as a physical league. The statistics are revealing just how important team defense is this season. Amazingly over half the teams - six (Illinois, Michigan, Michigan State, Minnesota, Northwestern and Wisconsin) - are averaging less than 60 points a game this season in Conference play. Purdue managed to escape this list, checking in at 60.6 points a game.
Scouting Northwestern
Northwestern enters Monday’s game with an overall record of 6-20 and 2-13 in Big Ten action. Northwestern’s lone Big Ten victories, both at home, were over Wisconsin and Michigan. In fact, all six of the Wildcats’ wins came on their home court. Center Amy Jaeschke, at 6-5, is one of the best young talents in the Big Ten and is averaging 13.8 points and 8.5 rebounds a game.
The Minnesota / Northwestern Series
Northwestern leads the series with Minnesota by a 29-26 margin. The Gophers have taken a big bite of the Wildcats’ series lead by winning the last 16 games. The 16-game winning streak is the Gophers’ longest against a Big Ten opponent in school history.
