BILLINGS, Mont.  – Montana State University Billings has one game this week against conference competition Seattle Pacific. The Yellowjackets are on a two-game conference slide and will need to play some tough basketball on both sides of the court to defeat the nationally-ranked Falcons.
 
The Yellowjackets dropped both Great Northwest Athletic Conference games last week on the road to Simon Fraser (74-73) and Western Washington (100-51) and need a win this week to pull the team out of the bottom of the conference standings.
 
MSU Billings (9-5, 1-3 GNAC) has had a tough opening conference schedule this season and will only see another strong opponent in the No. 14 Seattle Pacific team which is on a roll coming off a road sweep of both Western Washington and Simon Fraser last week.
 
The No. 14 Falcons (11-1, 3-1 GNAC) are off to their best start in five seasons and have only lost one game this season early on to the No. 7-ranked Alaska Anchorage Seawolves.
 
"SPU presents a tremendous challenge for us," MSUB head coach Kevin Woodin said. "They have tremendous team speed and have a lot of talented, experienced players. SPU had a 2-0 road trip last week while we lost both games against the same teams."
 
Seattle Pacific had to come back from being down by 11 points in both games last week to get its wins. The team is using a solid offense and smothering defense to contain its opponents.
 
"I am hopeful that we can respond appropriately after our lopsided defeat at WWU last Saturday," Woodin continued on last week's conference play. "We are very early in the conference season and I believe we can use that performance to better ourselves in the future. I also think it is important for us to play a better first half this weekend. In conference games thus far, we have not played to our potential in the first half."
 
 
Saturday, Jan 10, 7 p.m., Alterowitz Gymnasium
Live stats/video: msubsports.com
No. 14 Seattle Pacific University Falcons
2014-15 Record: 11-1, 3-1 GNAC
Head Coach: Julie Heisey (10th season)
2013-14 Record: 18-9, 11-7 GNAC
 
Senior guard Suzanna Ohlsen shot 50.0 percent, 16-32, scoring a combined 43 points in Seattle Pacific's two wins last week. Ohlsen added in five rebounds while dishing out eight assists and contributing nine steals over the two games. She is now shooting a combined 54.9 percent from the field, 44.7 percent from the 3-point arc, and 81.5 percent from the free-throw line.
 
For its recent efforts, Seattle Pacific was named the GNAC Team of the Week, while Ohlsen was the GNAC Player of the Week.
 
Contributing on the floor for the No. 14 Falcons, senior guard Aubree Callen is averaging 13.3 points (No. 12 in the GNAC) and 3.3 assists (No. 9 in the GNAC) and Betsy Kingma with 10.4 points (27th in the GNAC) and 2.9 3-pointers per game (No. 3 in the GNAC) for SPU has been able to score in multiple ways.
 
The team is averaging 76.1 points per game on 45.6 percent shooting. The Falcons are nationally-ranked No. 3 in 3-point shooting at 40.8 percent, and No. 6 in free-throw shooting at 78.4 percent.
 
The Series: MSU Billings is 19-24 all-time against Seattle Pacific. The Yellowjackets are 13-5 at home. MSUB is 5-4 against the Falcons in their last nine meetings.
 
Last season: The two teams split their games last season with MSUB losing the first contest in a 63-57 loss on the road during the ROOT Sports broadcast game. The Yellowjackets came back to win the game in Alterowitz, 74-59 a month later at home.
 
Senior forward Kayleen Goggins continues to rank No. 2 in the conference in point production with 19.3 per game. After Ohlsen, MSUB's Alisha Breen is No. 4, averaging 16.6 points. Breen is also No. 4 on the boards with 7.3 while Goggins is ranked No. 6 in rebounds with 7.1.
 
Last week Goggins poured in 48 points with 20 rebounds. She was also 16-21 from the free-throw line.
 
"We have had a good week of practice thus far," Woodin commented on the team. "In my opinion, we need to be better connected on defense, and offensively, we need to get better ball and player movement. We are trying to simplify things this week, and our on-court communication by our players has to improve."
 
Senior Quinn Peoples is No. 4 in the GNAC in 3-point field goals made per game at 2.2. The Butte, Mont., native was 2-5 (40.0 percent) from long-range against SFU last week. Peoples is third on the team in points per game with 12.1, and third on the team in rebounds per game at 5.1.
 
Senior guard Annie DePuydt was 4-5 from the field against Simon Fraser last week, and is tied with Peoples in rebounding also averaging 5.1 per game. Redshirt junior Monica Grimsrud continues to improve her numbers this season and is making her presence felt, especially on defense. Grimsrud is now ranked in the top-30 in steals and blocked shots in the conference.
 
Freshman guard Rylee Kane leads the team in assists, averaging 3.1 per game and is No. 6 in the conference in assist/turnover ratio at 1.6.
 
The Yellowjackets are averaging 72.4 points per game and shooting 40.0 percent from the field and 38.4 percent from the 3-point arc. MSU Billings is pulling in 41.4 rebounds while averaging 14.0 assists per game.
 
Looking ahead: Montana State University Billings plays at home for the next two weeks. This Saturday's game against SPU will be followed by two more games next week. On Thursday, Jan. 15, MSUB hosts Central Washington at 5:15 p.m. with another GNAC contest on Saturday, Jan. 17 against Northwest Nazarene, also at the early time of 5:15 p.m.
 
"Our team enjoys playing at home," Coach Woodin said. "It will be great to have our crowd behind us and hopefully we can build some momentum over the next two weeks. All three of our upcoming opponents have been playing very well lately so this home stand represents a great challenge for our team." 
 
Career Watch
 
Goggins had 48 points and 20 rebounds in the Yellowjackets' two games last week. Goggins now has 1,166 career points and 513 career rebounds putting her at No. 18 on both the all-time point and all-time rebound career lists at MSUB.
 
Peoples currently has 31 3-point baskets on the season, which takes her career total to 200 at MSUB, and moves her into sole possession of No. 2 at MSUB in career 3-point shots. The all-time leader, Alira Carpenter, had 294 during her time as a Yellowjacket.
 
GNAC STANDINGS
                                                GNAC    Overall
Alaska Anchorage                      3-1        13-1
Seattle Pacific                            3-1       11-1
Simon Fraser                             2-1        6-5
Alaska Fairbanks                        2-2       10-4
Central Washington                    2-2        7-5
Northwest Nazarene                   2-2        4-9
Western Washington                  1-2        7-5
Saint Martin's                             1-2         4-7
Western Oregon                         1-2         4-7
Montana State Billings                 1-3         9-5