This Week In Warrior Athletics

January 29, 2007

EVENTS: 

Women’s and men’s basketball doubleheader: at Westminster College, Saturday, Feb. 3, women at 4:30 p.m., men at 6:30 p.m., Salt Lake City, Utah. 

Women’s basketball: 

After finishing the first half of league play undefeated, the Warriors will try to duplicate that feat in the second half, starting Saturday against Westminster.

The Warriors, ranked No. 2 in the country at 21-1 overall and a perfect 7-0 in league play, face a Westminster team it defeated 79-47 on the opening weekend of league play. Westminster finished the first half of the league season at 3-4 and is 15-8 overall.

LCSC, which defeated Carroll last weekend in Helena to take over sole possession of first place, probably will be without the services of senior forward Aundrea Morrison on Saturday. Morrison hurt her leg in the final seconds of last week’s win over Carroll. Doctors are still waiting for the swelling in the leg to go down before they can perform an MRI and learn more about the injury.

Morrison missed five games early in the season because of an unrelated injury and posted double digits in both points and rebounds in both games last week. She’s the team’s second leading scorer and rebounder, behind fellow All-American candidate Ashley Baker. She’s also ninth in the NAIA in field goal percentage at 58.3 percent.

The Warriors, however, are a versatile team and can go with Katya Yancheva, Mandy Troutt or Vanessa West as Morrison’s replacement in the starting lineup.

LCSC is outscoring the opposition by better than 22 points a game, which ranks third in the NAIA, and is shooting nearly 47 percent from the field and 36 percent at the 3-point line.

The Warriors rank third in the NAIA in assists, fourth in assist/turnover ratio, fifth in total rebound margin, seven in scoring offense and field goal percentage, and ninth in defensive rebounding.

Junior point guard Katie Hart is third in the country in assists, while Baker is fourth in offensive rebounds at nearly four a game.

Westminster is coming off a three-point win over Rocky Mountain. The Griffins have four players averaging in double figures, led by Elisa Leader at 14.4 points per game. The team ranks 10th in the country in 3-pointers made per game at 7.6.

After this contest, LCSC will play four of its final six games at home. 

Frontier Conference standings – LCSC 7-0, 21-1; Montana-Western 6-1, 21-2; Carroll 5-2, 21-2; Montana Tech 3-4, 15-6; Montana State-Northern 3-4, 15-7; Westminster 3-4, 15-8; Rocky Mountain 1-6, 7-16; Great Falls 0-7, 2-18. 

Men’s basketball: 

The Warriors hope to change a couple of things this week when they square off against preseason conference favorite Westminster.

During last week’s road swing, in which LCSC defeated Rocky Mountain before losing to Carroll, the Warriors fell in big holes early before rallying. L-C rallied from 20 points down to tie Carroll, but the Saints prevailed to leave both teams in what appears to be a two-team race for the title. Both are 6-1, while Westminster is one of three teams at 4-3.

Overall, LCSC stands 17-5 and is ranked No. 17 in the country, while Westminster, the team the coaches named as the favorite to win the league before the season, stands 12-10.

“Things just get tougher going into the second part of the league,” LCSC coach Tim Walker says. “We do have 4 of our last 7 at home, but that definitely comes with no guarantees either.  Our biggest obstacle right now is ourselves.  We need to get a little bit more of an edge to us and our intensity.  That will start in practice this week, and hopefully carry through the rest of the season.” 

The other area LCSC would like to fix this week is its health. Keith Scarbrough, one of the top three point threats on the team, has missed the last three games with a leg infection. He was the only player to start the first 19 games this season. Jon Daly also is fighting a similar infection, but did see some playing time last week.

“We don’t know if Keith is ready or not,” Walker says.  “He still has been receiving treatments, and to my knowledge, has not been released.  It’s a day by day thing and we’ll have to wait and see if he will be ready by the end of the week.”

Defense continues to pave the way to the team’s success. LCSC is fourth in the country in points allowed at just 58.4 per game and also is fourth in turnover margin, forcing 6.4 more than committing. LCSC is fourth in 3-point field goal defense, allowing opponents to just shoot 28.8 percent from the arc.

LCSC is also outscoring opponents by nearly 20 points a game, which ranks fifth in the country, and is seventh in field goal percentage defense at 39.7 percent.

Mike Gordy, who ranks 11th in field goal percentage, leads LCSC in scoring at 16.9 points per game. Chris Pitts is the top rebounder at 5.6.

Westminster also focuses on defense. The team leads the country in defensive rebounding and is 14th in points allowed at 65.3 per game. Nate Sanchez leads the team in both scoring and rebounding at 13.6 points and 6.3 boards per game. 

Frontier Conference standings – LCSC 6-1, 17-5; Carroll 6-1, 16-6; Montana State-Northern 4-3, 14-8; Westminster 4-3, 12-10; Montana Tech 4-3, 9-11; Rocky Mountain 3-4, 13-10; Montana-Western 1-6, 7-13; Great Falls 0-7, 11-12. 

Baseball: 

The baseball program is looking for people in the Lewiston-Clarkston Valley to house ballplayers from visiting teams who come to Lewiston to play the Warriors during the 2007 season.

Families will choose the number of players they would like to host (minimum of two) and provide a place to sleep, meals, and transportation for the players. In return, host families will receive an LCSC season baseball pass and food vouchers (gift certificates) to A&B Foods to help out with the cost of food.

The teams and dates for housing needs are Albertson (Feb. 16-17), Whitworth (Feb. 17) Missouri Western (Feb. 21-23), St. Martin’s (Feb. 21-24), Western Oregon (Feb. 23-24), Air Force, Southern Utah, and Utah Valley (March 1-4), California Baptist (April 2-4), Dixie State (April 5-7), and Linfield (May 5-6).

Anyone who can house two or more players on any of the above dates, or have a specific team request to host, are asked to call the LCSC baseball office at 792-2279 and ask for either Tyler Best or Lindsay Matthews. 

Tennis: 

The Warrior men’s tennis team successfully opened its season last Saturday with a 6-3 win over Pacific Lutheran University, an NCAA Division III team, in a match at Wenatchee.

Borja Molas, Cedric Dufour, Kevin Lee, and Andy Hunt picked up singles victories, while Lee and Ari Zaslow, along with Dufour and Hunt picked up wins in doubles play.

The men will be back in action on Feb. 9 at home against Whitworth and Montana State-Billings. The women’s team kicks off its season on the same day at home against MSU-Billings.