Bearcats Head Northeast to Take On Whitman and Whitworth

By Evan Giddings, Student Assistant Athletics Communications Director

SALEM, ORE. -- Coming off its first conference win last Saturday in convincing fashion, the Willamette University women's basketball team will look to ride the momentum into this weekend, as the Bearcats travel to take on Whitman College on Friday, Jan. 30 and nationally-ranked Whitworth University on Saturday Jan. 31. Tip-off on Friday will be at 6 p.m. (PST) and Saturday's game will be at 4 p.m.

A Live Audio Webcast of both games will be available through Willamette featuring Mike Allegre as the announcer. You also can follow each game through Live Video provided by Whitman and Whitworth. In addition Live Stats will be available at Whitman and Live Stats will be available at Whitworth.

With the win last weekend, Willamette now owns an overall record of 6-11 with a 1-7 Northwest Conference record.

The Bearcats bested archrival Linfield College, scoring the first 11 points of the game and never trailing on their way to winning 71-56.

The Linfield game was truly a team effort as four members of the team scored double-digit points. Katie Kalugin(Sr., G, Woodburn, OR/Woodburn HS) led the way with 17 points and 13 rebounds. Kylie Towry (So./Fr., G, Medford, OR/South Medford HS) scored 13 and made three 3-pointers. Jojo DeLong(Sr., PG, Santa Clarita, CA/Canyon HS) and Ashley Evans (Fr., PG, Canby, OR/Canby HS) each contributed 11 points.

On defense, the Bearcats also did an impressive job of not allowing the Wildcats many open looks, as they held Linfield to just 31% shooting on the night.

WU will need to keep up the defensive pressure when they take on Whitman and Whitworth this weekend. Whitman is 10-7 overall with a 5-3 NWC record while, Whitworth -- which is ranked #17 in the nation by D3hoops.com -- is 16-1 overall and 7-1 in the NWC.

The matchup to watch this weekend will be the guard play, as WU will be going up against the conference's top two leading scorers in Whitworth's KC McConnell (Jr., G), who is averaging 17.6 points per game, and Whitman's Heather Johns (Sr., G), who is averaging 16.3 points per game.

As for the Bearcats' guards, DeLong is averaging 12.8 points a game while leading the NWC with 4.1 assists per game. She has played the most minutes of anyone in the conference, having logged 33.1 minutes per game.

Her backcourt mates Towry and Kalugin also have been impressive this season. Towry leads the NWC in 3-point baskets (48) and is second in 3-point shooting percentage (41.7%), while Kalugin has averaged a team-high 10.3 points per game through the first eight conference matches.

In Friday's game, Hailey Ann Maeda (Jr., F) will anchor the post for Whitman. She has averaged 9.3 points per game and recorded 6.8 rebounds per game.

As for Whitworth, the Pirates also have a strong frontcourt, led by Jessica Kramer (Sr., F) and Katara Belton-Sharp (Sr., F). Kramer has averaged 10.1 points per game and 7.2 rebounds per game, while Belton-Sharp has scored 10.5 points per game and hauled in 5.5 rebounds per game.