ST. LOUIS – The University of Missouri-St. Louis women's basketball team looks to extend its three-game winning streak as it embarks on its final road trip of the regular season beginning this week.
The Tritons (11-12, 9-8 GLVC) head to Springfield, Mo. to take on 23rd ranked Drury this Thursday at 5:45 p.m. at the O'Reilly Family Events Center and then will head to Bolivar, Mo., on Saturday afternoon to take on the Bearcats of Southwest Baptist at 1 p.m. at the Meyer Sports Center.
UMSL extended its win streak last week with a pair of home wins. The Tritons handed Illinois Springfield a 71-53 defeat last Thursday behind 14 points and a career-high 11 rebounds from
Alex Wolff. UMSL followed that up with a 68-60 win over Quincy on Saturday afternoon as Wolff finished with a career-high 18 points along with eight rebounds. She was named the Great Lakes Valley Conference's Player of the Week for her efforts.
The Tritons are averaging 68.8 points per contest over their last four games and have given up an average of 59 points in those outings.
UMSL has gotten balanced scoring in those contests with five players averaging double figures led by
Amaya Blake with 14 points per game. Wolff is averaging close to 13 points per outing while
Audrey Martinez-Stewart is nearly averaging a double-double with 10.8 points and 9.8 rebounds per contest.
Mara Rieder and
Emerson Weller are contributing 10.8 and 10.0 points per game respectively.
Jalysa Stokes continues to lead the GLVC in scoring at 19.2 points per contest.
The Tritons are ranked 10th in the latest GLVC Point Rating System (PRS) that determines the eight teams that will advance to the GLVC Tournament March 7-10 at Hyland Arena on the campus of Lindenwood University in St. Charles, Mo.
UMSL has a PRS of 2.97 and trails Quincy for the final spot in the tournament by 0.12 points. McKendree currently holds the top spot with a rating of 3.941 and is only 0.003 points ahead of Drury and Lewis who are tied for second. Maryville, Illinois Springfield, Upper Iowa and Rockhurst are in the fourth-seventh spots.
About Drury – The Panthers enter Thursday's contest with a record of 18-4 including 13-3 in the GLVC and have won 10 straight contests. They extended their win streak last week with road wins over Rockhurst (85-67) and William Jewell (75-56).
Thursday's contest will be a matchup between two of the top scoring defenses in the conference this season. The Tritons are giving up an average of 61 points per game to lead the league while Drury is yielding 66.2 points per contest.
Resse Scharf leads the Panthers in scoring and rebounding with 16.5 points and 8.8 rebounds per game. She is joined in double figures by Beth Matas Martin with 16 points per contest while Caitlynn Daniels is contributing 13.9 points and 7.2 rebounds per outing. Daniels leads the team with 121 assists and 25 steals while Schaaf and Anna Hitt are tied for the team lead with 13 blocks each.
About Southwest Baptist – The Bearcats enter Thursday's game against McKendree with an overall record of 9-13 including 5-11 in the GLVC. SBU snapped a six-game losing streak with a 100-71 win at William Jewell last Thursday but has dropped seven of its last eight contests.
Over their last nine games the Bearcats are giving up an average of 81.1 points per game and haven't given up fewer than 71 points in any of those contests.
SBU is led in scoring by Karlee Holland with 9.0 points per contest while Tori Hamilton and Kallyn Stumbo are contributing 8.9 and 8.8 points per outing respectively. Hamilton and Stumbo are the team's leading rebounders with 6.5 rebounds per game apiece. Stumbo also leads the squad in assists (107) and steals (48) while Hamilton has blocked 26 shots.
