THE SCHEDULE
Thursday, Dec. 3                Western Oregon at Seattle Pacific, 7:00 p.m.
                                                Brougham Pavilion (2,650) / Seattle, Wash.
                                                Live Webcast        Live stats
 
Saturday, Dec. 5                 Concordia at Seattle Pacific, 7:00 p.m.
                                                Brougham Pavilion (2,650) / Seattle, Wash.
                                                Live Webcast        Live stats

  
        Weekly release, with complete updated stats (PDF)

SEATTLE – Home at last.
 
After playing all five of their November women's basketball games on the road in California, the Seattle Pacific Falcons get to put their talents on display in front of the home fans this week.
 
The games in Brougham Pavilion will be big ones, too, because they are the first two games on the Great Northwest Athletic Conference schedule. Western Oregon comes to town on Thursday night, followed by conference newcomer Concordia of Oregon on Saturday.
 
Both tip off at 7:00 p.m.
 
SPU takes to its home court with a 2-3 record from those first five road games. The Falcons haven't played since last Tuesday's 68-62 loss at Point Loma Nazarene in San Diego, taking some time off for Thanksgiving before getting back to work in preparation for this week's visit from the two Oregon schools.
 
FOLLOW IT LIVE
Free live Webcasts and live stats will be available for all GNAC games, home and away. All Webcasts will be through Stretch Internet, the conference's official internet provider. The appropriate links can be found at the top of this story.
 
IS IT 10 YEARS ALREADY? 2005 TEAM REUNITES
About half of the 12 players on the 2004-05 team that went all the way to the NCAA Division II championship game will be in Brougham Pavilion for a 10-year reunion on Saturday when Concordia visits.
 
That group of Falcons put together a 30-3 overall record, and won the GNAC title with a 17-1 mark. Along the way, the put together a 17-game winning streak.
 
SPU breezed through three games at the West Regionals, winning by 24, 23, and 15 points. Then at the Elite Eight in Hot Springs, Ark., the Falcons beat Grand Valley State, 67-55, and Merrimack, 73-64, before falling to Washburn in the title game, 70-53
 
Amy Taylor led the team in scoring with a 12.4 average. Carli Smith averaged a double-double of 10.8 points and 10.1 rebounds, and 6-foot-4 center Brittney Kroon blocked 131 shots.
 
FALCONS PICKED FOR 3^RD IN GNAC
Coaches from the Great Northwest Athletic Conference have tabbed SPU for a third-place finish in the upcoming season.
               
Coming off a 22-7 season (13-5 GNAC) that extended all the way to the NCAA West Regional semifinals, the Falcons received 86 points in the preseason poll that was released on Oct. 16.
 
Defending conference champion Alaska Anchorage, which was ranked No. 1 in Division II for several weeks last season, is the overwhelming favorite to repeat as champion. The Seawolves received 10 of the 11 first-place votes and 120 points. Western Washington is tabbed for second with 104 points, and right behind Seattle Pacific is Central Washington, fourth with 83 points.
 
Through the three weeks of preseason play, the conference has a very wide-open look to it. The only undefeated team is Alaska Anchorage (11-0), and Central Washington (4-1) is the only one-loss team. The other nine schools have at least three defeats.





SO WHAT'S THE STORY THIS WEEK?
-- The Falcons are looking to halt a three-game losing streak. Their last such streak was Dec. 19, 2013-Jan. 4, 2014.
-- Seattle Pacific is 13-1 all-time in GNAC opening games.
-- That includes a 6-0 record when the opener is in Brougham Pavilion.
-- Last season's conference opener was in Brougham and ended in a 75-47 rout of Alaska Fairbanks as then-senior guard Suzanna Ohlsen scored her 1,000th career point.
-- The only loss for the Falcons in a GNAC opener was in 2011 when Simon Fraser won in Canada, 79-74.
-- Coach Julie Heisey is 9-1 all-time in the first conference game of the season.
-- This is just the second time that SPU and WOU will open against each other. The only other one was on Jan. 9, 2010, when the Falcons won in Monmouth, 75-62.
-- Although SPU still has a dominant advantage in the series (36-4), last year's series against the Wolves was split, with each team winning at home.
-- The Falcons have played five times against Concordia, winning all five games while the Cavaliers were an NAIA school.
-- The most recent of those was on Dec. 12, 2009, when Seattle Pacific rolled to a 92-48 victory in Brougham.
-- Heisey is 19-2 against Western Oregon and 3-1 against third-year coach Holli Howard-Carpenter.
-- The aforementioned 2009 game was Heisey's only one against Concordia. This will be her first game against second-year Cavaliers coach Sean Kelly.
 
SCOUTING THE WESTERN OREGON WOLVES: 1-5, 0-0 GNAC
All-time series: SPU leads, 36-4. Current series streak: SPU won 1. Last time: SPU 69, WOU 64; Feb. 21, 2015 at Seattle. Wolves on the Web.
Wolves in a nutshell: Points haven't been easy to come by for Western Oregon early in the season, as it averages just 53.8 per game, with two outings in the 40s and three in the 50s. Gone via graduation is Dana Goularte, who averaged 15.6 points last season. Taking over the team's scoring leadership is junior 5-foot-10 guard Jordan Mottershaw leads the way at 11.3 per game. Sydney Azorr, a 5-10 sophomore guard, is next at 9.0. Mottershaw came up with a 20-point performance, and Azorr had 17 in Western Oregon's only victory, a 77-75 overtime decision against Evergreen State on Nov. 22. Jasmine Miller, a 5-11 sophomore forward, leads the way on the boards at 5.3 per game, and also is one of WOU's sharper shooters at .565.
 
SCOUTING THE CONCORDIA CAVALIERS: 1-5, 0-0 GNAC
All-time series: SPU leads, 5-0. Current series streak: SPU won 5. Last time: SPU 92, CU 48 (Dec. 12, 2009 at Seattle). Cavaliers on the Web.
Cavaliers in a nutshell: Concordia returns four starters from last year's team that went 12-16 overall in its final NAIA season. Those four starters just happen to be the four top Cavaliers scorers from 2014-15. At the top of the pack is 5-foot-7 sophomore guard Sierra Dean, who actually started just 15 of the 28 games, but still averaged 13.7 points and 4.3 rebounds per contest. She's scoring at a 14.7 clip this season, and has improved her field goal shooting significantly, now at .453 after hitting just .370 a year ago. Also back is 5-8 junior guard Lexi Campbell. She averaged 11.0 in 14-15, though she's at just 5.3 now. Making an early impact for Concordia is 6-1 freshman forward Bailey Cartwright, with her averages of 10.3 points and a team-high 4.8 rebounds per contest, slightly ahead of Dean's 4.7. Cartwright, who tallied 21 in last Friday's 64-58 loss at Metro State in Denver, also is a solid shooter, hitting .523 (23 of 44). Danielle Hartzog, a 5-9 sophomore guard, is scoring an average of 9.0 points per game.
 
FALCON REPLAY
-- Courtney Hollander scored a career-high 17 points and collected13 rebounds for her second double-double of the season, but Point Loma had four players in double figures, led by the 18 points of Roya Rustamzada, to beat SPU in a non-conference game last Tuesday in San Diego, 68-62.
 
COACH JULIE HEISEY SAYS …
(On Western Oregon)
"They have a lot of young players who are really good. They run a match-up zone that changes what you do, and they like to push the ball. They play really hard."

 

(On Concordia)
"They're very athletic. They have some really nice freshman and sophomore players. They're just good athletes who can score in different ways. They'll press and run some different defenses at you, so that will be another challenge."
 
(On the season so far)
"It's early in the season, we have a young team, and we've had some injuries. But I do like the fact that even though our record doesn't look great right now, we're doing a lot of things really well. The season is a journey; it's not a bunch of sprints. You just have to be able to see the process of that journey. We have to get some wins. But right now, we're going a lot of really good things on defense, and we've played some very good teams. … We know that we definitely have to lower our turnovers, but our rebounding and defense are pretty good."
 
KEEPING SOME QUALITY COMPANY
Through the first five games of the season, junior guard Stacey Lukasiewicz is by far and away SPU's assists leader with 19. That's an average of 3.8 per game for the junior from Centennial, Colo., tying her for No. 10 in the GNAC. She already has set a single-game career high, earning eight in the 89-43 romp past Fresno Pacific on Nov. 14, and nearly matched it last Tuesday with seven at Point Loma Nazarene.

 

But there's more. Lukasiewicz, now a starter after playing a reserve role the past two years, is on early-season level footing with two former teammates who made their names in part on precision passing.
 
Through five games last season, Suzanna Ohlsen had 20 assists, and Aubree Callen had 19. By year's end, Ohlsen finished with 110 assists for 28 games (3.9 average) and Callen had 91 in 29 games (3.1). With 22 regular-season games to go, Lukasiewicz has a very good chance of hitting triple digits by season's end.


 

TOUGH BREAK FOR SHIM
Junior guard Rachel Shim, who had been earning the most playing time of her career, saw her season come to a painful end last Tuesday night when she suffered a knee injury late in the 68-62 loss at Pont Loma Nazarene.
 
The 5-foot-8 Shim (Sammamish, Wash. / Skyline HS) had played in each of the first five games, starting one of them. She was posting career-best numbers in minutes played (17.4), scoring (4.6), rebounds (1.8) and assists (1.8). Shim already had tied single-game highs in points (9 vs. Fresno Pacific), assists (4 at Humboldt State), and steals (2 at Point Loma).
 
NATIONALLY SPEAKING
SPU is (out of 318 Division II teams) …
-- 16th in rebounding margin (+11.6)
-- 29th in free throw percentage (.770)
-- 38th in offensive rebounds (16.0)
 
Individually, Courtney Hollander is 36th in defensive rebounds (7.0), along with being 67th in total rebounds (9.4).
 
Click on this link to see how SPU stacks up nationally. Click on this link to see where GNAC teams and players rank within Division II.
 
AROUND THE WEST
It's barely the end of November, but the number of unbeaten teams in the West Region already is down to three.
 
Alaska Anchorage is 11-0 overall heading into the start of GNAC play. Cal Baptist, the defending region champion, is 6-0 and begins its Pacific West Conference schedule on Thursday. Chico State is 4-0, and opens its California Collegiate Athletic Association schedule on Friday at San Francisco State.
 
The number of one-loss teams also is small, totaling just four: Central Washington (4-1), UC San Diego and Point Loma Nazarene (both 5-1), and Cal State San Bernardino (3-1).
 
MILESTONES IN THE MAKING
100^th FT                  Hannah Rodrigues (has 99)
100^th rebound       Stacey Lukasiewicz (has 98)
200^th rebound       Molly Grager (has 191)
 
MILESTONES MADE LAST WEEK
100^th rebound       Brianne Lasconia (has 101)

AROUND THE GNAC
Click on this link for news, notes, results, and stats from around the Great Northwest Athletic Conference.

UP NEXT
The Falcons will be off entirely from competition next week to focus on academic finals. They will return to action in Brougham Pavilion on Friday and Saturday, Dec. 18 and 19, in the Sodexo Tip-Off Classic. Concordia will be back in town for that tournament, playing Wisconsin-Parkside on the 18th and Eastern New Mexico on the 19th, both at 4:30 p.m. SPU has both 7 p.m. games, going against Eastern New Mexico the first night and Parkside the second.

 
GNAC STANDINGS
                                                                GNAC                 Overall
Alaska Anchorage            0-0           11-0
Central Washington          0-0            4-1
Alaska Fairbanks            0-0            5-3
Western Washington          0-0            3-3
Seattle Pacific             0-0            2-3
Simon Fraser                0-0            2-3
Montana State Billings      0-0            2-3
Northwest Nazarene          0-0            1-4
Concordia                   0-0            1-5
Saint Martin's              0-0            1-5
Western Oregon              0-0            1-5