THE SCHEDULE.
Thursday, Dec. 5                  Seattle Pacific at Simon Fraser, 5:15 p.m.
                                                West Gym / Burnaby, B.C.
                                                Live Webcast        Live stats
 
Saturday, Dec. 7                  Seattle Pacific at Western Washington
                                                Carver Gymnasium / Bellingham, Wash.
                                                Live Webcast        Live stats
 
 
SEATTLE – They've won in a blowout at home. They've won by coming from behind in the fourth quarter at home.
 
Now, the Seattle Pacific Falcons want to show they can win on the road.
 
SPU (2-8) will get two chances to do that this week, albeit in two of the toughest places to snag a victory as they visit Simon Fraser and Western Washington to begin the Great Northwest Athletic Conference schedule.
 
Tip-off on Thursday in Burnaby, B.C., is at 5:15 p.m. On Saturday in Bellingham, action gets under way at 7:00 p.m.
 
Having hosted two home tournaments in the past three weeks, the Falcons scored their second win of the season last Saturday, coming from 11 points behind with 9:17 left in the game to beat Colorado Christian, 64-54, in the finale of the SPU Thanksgiving Tournament. They picked up their first win of the year on Nov. 15 in the SPU West Region Crossover, 72-54 against Cal State San Marcos.
 
FOLLOW IT LIVE
Both of this week's games and all GNAC contests will have free live Webcasts on YouTube and free live stats. The appropriate links are at the top of this story.
 
SPU TABBED FOR 8TH IN GNAC
Seattle Pacific was picked for an eighth-place finish in the GNAC women's basketball poll..
 
​The Falcons received 34 points in voting by the conference's 10 coaches. Western Washington and Montana State Billings are essentially co-favorites for the title.
 
Western, a 54-52 winner against the Yellowjackets in the GNAC Tournament championship game, picked up four first-place votes and 91 points. Billings, which won the regular-season crown last year with a 16-2 record (28-7 overall) received five firsts and 90 points. The other first-place vote went to Alaska Anchorage, which is No. 3 overall with 79 points.





SO WHAT'S THE STORY THIS WEEK?
-- The Falcons are 19-3 all-time in GNAC openers, including 9-3 on the road.
-- Last year, SPU played its first conference game at home, rolling past Alaska Fairbanks, 70-43.
-- The first road conference game last season was at Northwest Nazarene right after the holiday break, and the Nighthawks pulled out a 50-47 victory.
-- Seattle Pacific was 3-6 in GNAC road games in 2023-24.
-- The most recent road GNAC opener was in 2022, a 65-60 win at Alaska Fairbanks.
-- Through 22 seasons of GNAC play, Seattle Pacific has the third-best winning percentage of .678 (271-129). Western Washington is on top at .755 (299-97),and Alaska Anchorage is at .687 (266-121). Simon Fraser, which joined the conference in 2010-11, is fifth at .560 (141-101).
-- After an 0-5 start, SPU has split its last four games.
-- Seattle Pacific and Simon Fraser have traded sweeps the past two seasons. The Falcons won both during 2022-23, including 59-48 in Burnaby. The Red Leafs turned the tables last year, including 83-57 on their home court.
-- On the other hand, Western Washington has won 12 straight against SPU. The last victory for the Falcons on Jan. 17, 2019 in Seattle, 61-59.
-- Their last win against the Vikings in Bellingham was 75-63 on Jan. 11, 2018.
-- Although they rank No. 7 in GNAC rebounding at 38.1, the Falcons are No. 5 in offensive rebounds at 13.1 per game.
-- Seattle Pacific is No. 4 on the conference list in blocked shots at 3.56 per game.
-- Senior center Schuyler Berry is tied for No. 10 in blocks at 0.9 per game. She had three in last Saturday's victory against Colorado Christian.
 
SCOUTING THE SIMON FRASER RED LEAFS: 7-1, 0-0 GNAC.
All-time series: Simon leads, 28-16.  Current series streak: Simon won 2.  Last time: Simon 77, SPU 69 (Feb. 22, 2024 at Seattle).  Last SPU series win: SPU 59, Simon 48 (Feb. 16, 2023 at Burnaby).  Red Leafs on the Web.
Red Leafs in a nutshell:  Most of the time when a big scorer is on the court, she might be at the top of the conference list – and that's exactly where Simon senior 5-foot-10 guard Sophia Wisotzki is. But that's not the whole story. With her 26.0 average through nine games, she's No. 2 on the Division II list, trailing only the 29.1 average of Emilee Weakley of Frostburg State (Maryland). And Wisotzki's 234 total points is more than anyone in D2 has scored during this early part of the season. She has two game of 31 points, two more of 29, and a low of 18, taking anywhere between 17 and 34 shots per game. She lit up SPU twice last year, going for 29 in Burnaby and 32 in Seattle. Wisotzki has 28 makes from 3-point range, and already has taken 69 free throws (sinking 60) Junior 5-9 guard / forward Myrlaine Shelvey chips in a respectable 10.1 points per game  The Leafs had a five-game winning streak going before falling to Point Loma Nazarene last Saturday, 86-64.
 
SCOUTING THE WESTERN WASHINGTON VIKINGS: 4-3, 0-0 GNAC
All-time series: WWU leads, 70-32.  Current series streak: WWU won 12.  Last time: WWU 66, SPU 55 (Feb. 24, 2024 at Seattle).  Last SPU series win: SPU 61, WWU 59 (Jan. 17, 2019 at Seattle).  Vikings on the Web.
Vikings in a nutshell:  Western Washington dropped its first two games of the season to Cal State Dominguez Hills and Cal State Los Angeles (the same two teams SPU lost to on the same weekend in Carson, Calif.), but has won four out of five since then. Junior 6-foot forward Alyson Deaver, who just named GNAC Player of the Week on Monday, averages 15.0 points per game (No. 7 in the GNAC) and 5.7 rebounds. The transfer from Utah Tech puts in those points on .475 field goal accuracy, including a combined 13 of 22 for 59.1 percent in last weekend's victories against Westminster and Biola. Olivia Wikstrom, a senior 6-1 guard, is tied for No. 8 on the conference scoring list at 13.4. She also is No. 7 in rebounding at 6.4 per game. Junior 5-5 guard Mason Oberg chips in 11.3 points.
 
A FINE, FABULOUS 4th QUARTER
In a span of nine minutes last Saturday, the Falcons went from looking at another disappointing loss to pulling out a remarkable win.
 
Down 50-39 to Colorado Christian with 9:17 left in the final game of the SPU Thanksgiving Tournament, SPU put together a 25-4 scoring run to catch up with and then pull away from the Cougars, 64-54.
 
 

That scoring spree included a stretch of 14 straight points as the Falcons went from 52-43 behind to 57-52 in front. Layne Kearns started it with a coast-to-coast lay-in, capped it with a 3-pointer from the left corner, and in between drained another dagger from the left corner that tied the game at 52-52.
 
Senior wing Lolo Weatherspoon put the Falcons in front when she came streaking down the middle of the court all the way to under the basket and converted Hunter Beirne's pinpoint pass into a lay-in for a 54-52 lead with 4:45 left. In fact, that was the second of three consecutive assist by Beirne. She also set up Kearns' game-tying trey, then found her again for the capper that made it 57-52.
 
Grace Turley and Grace Leasure also buried buckets during that outburst.
 
The group of Kearns, Beirne, Weatherspoon, Turley, and Leasure were on the court for the entirety of the fourth quarter except for seven seconds when Kearns had to sub out to deal with a shoulder wrap that had come undone. They put up 27 points, allowed only six, and accounted for 12 rebounds, five assists, four steals, one blocked shot, and had no turnovers.
 
 

BERRY, BEIRNE IN PRESEASON TOP 15
For the second straight year, Seattle Pacific center Schuyler Berry has been voted to the Preseason All-GNAC team – and this time, she is joined by veteran point guard Hunter Beirne, who's on the elite 15-player squad for the first time.
 
A 6-foot-3 center, Berry is entering her senior season coming off her best year as a Falcon in terms of scoring and rebounding. She averaged 9.7 points and 4.9 rebounds per game last winter, starting 26 of SPU's 29 contests. She also averaged 0.9 blocks per game, swatting away 26 shots. Along the way, Berry scored her 500th career point and pulled down her 300th career rebound.
 
Now in her fifth year, Beirne is the ultimate point guard with her intelligence and ability to read what's going on during any given moment and then make a quick decision on how to handle it. Last year, she averaged a career-best 9.5 points and handed out a team-high 64 assists, the second straight season she has led the team in helpers

BIG ON THE BOARDS
While the Falcons have sometimes struggled to knock down shots, they have done a credible job of pulling down rebounds.
 
In nine games, SPU has had the better of the boards in five of them. That includes both games last weekend when the Falcons were plus-9 against Metro State (41-32) and plus-6 vs. Colorado Christian (41-35). They also had a plus-9 (40-31) against Cal State Los Angeles and were plus-10 (36-26) against Cal State San Marcos. There was one game (Gannon on Nov. 2) in which each team had 37.
 
Overall, Seattle Pacific has a 343-335 edge heading into this week, including 119-101 on the offensive glass. Those offensive boards have led to 93 second-chance points. The opponents have turned their 101 boards into 89 second-chance points.
 
COACH KAREN BYERS SAYS …
(On Simon Fraser)
"You'll be hit by screen after screen. It won't be just fighting through one screen, we'll have fight through two, go over one, go under one. There's a lot of defensive strategy we'll have to prepare for."
 
(On Western Washington)
"They always put out a really good team. Their coaching staff is amazing, and they've been there for a long time. But they're playing differently this year, so I'm curious how we stack up with them."
 
 

(On last week's tournament)
"The first game (against Metro State), we must have had leftover turkey in us. We were not ready to play. It really showed the team that when we come out ready to play, we're a different team. When we take things too casually, it's going to be a battle the whole way."
 
(On winning one in come-from-behind fashion)
"For the girls' it's the known fact that they've done it before. So when we get to a game when we are down again, the knowledge of having done it before s just another kind of booster. We've done it before; we can do it again."
 
FALCON REPLAY
-- Ashlyn Yow of Metro State drained a 3-pointer from the left corner with 2.2 seconds remaining, then SPU saw two under-the-rim tries at a game-winner go astray, and the Roadrunners escaped with a 57-56 victory last Friday afternoon in the SPU Thanksgiving Tournament. 
--Layne Kearns in a career-high 18 points, getting 11 of those during a monstrous fourth-quarter comeback on Saturday as Seattle Pacific pulled out a 64-54 win against Colorado Christian on the final day of the SPU Thanksgiving Tournament.
 
AROUND THE WEST
Well, now … nothing quite like starting off the GNAC schedule than with a clash between the two favorites, right? That's what will happen on Thursday night in Bellingham when Western Washington hosts Montana State Billings. In the preseason coaches poll, the defending champion Yellowjackets (7-1) picked up five of the 10 first-place votes and 91 points, Western (4-3), which beat MSUB in last year's conference tournament title game, had four first and 90 points. Then, Billings visits Simon Fraser (7-2) on Saturday. Central Washington (6-0), the only unbeaten GNAC team so far, has just one game this week, hosting travel partner Northwest Nazarene on Saturday.
 
The California Collegiate Athletic Association started conference play last weekend with just one round of games. Cal State Dominguez Hills (8-0,1-0) is that circuit's last remaining unbeaten. Cal Poly Pomona and Chico State are both 5-1; Cal State Los Angeles has a 4-1 record. Pomona and Chico won their openers; L.A. dropped a 75-52 decision to Dominguez Hills.
 
Conference action opens this week in the Pacific West. Academy of Art leads the way with a 6-1 record, just ahead of Azusa Pacific at 5-1. Art is at home against Point Loma Nazarene (5-3) on Saturday. Azusa visits Dominican (6-5), which has played more games than anyone else in the conference and tied with Academy of Art for the most wins.
 
UP NEXT
The Falcons will get a breather next week as the have just one game on the docket. That will be Saturday, Dec. 14 at home against Stanislaus State. Tip-off in Brougham Pavilion is at 2:00 p.m.
 
 
 
GNAC STANDINGS
                                                  GNAC        Overall
Central Washington      0-0      6-0
Alaska Anchorage        0-0      8-1
Montana State Billings  0-0      7-1
Saint Martin's          0-0      6-1
Simon Fraser            0-0      7-2
Alaska Fairbanks        0-0      5-2
Northwest Nazarene      0-0      5-3
Western Washington      0-0      4-3
Western Oregon          0-0      2-4
Seattle Pacific         0-0      2-7


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