No. 4 AU Women To Travel To Findlay, Wayne State

For the full PDF version of the Week 10 game notes, go to http://goashlandeagles.com/sports/wbkb/2015-16/files/WK10WBKB.pdf.

Opening Tip

The No. 4-ranked Ashland University women's basketball team will conclude a three-game Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference roadtrip with two games away from Ashland in Week 10.

The Eagles, 16-0 overall and 10-0 in the GLIAC, lead the conference's overall standings by two games over Saginaw Valley State, and the South Division by three games over both Ohio Dominican and Walsh. AU will travel to Findlay (11-5, 6-4) on Thursday, Jan. 21 at 5:30 p.m., then go to Wayne State (7-9, 2-8) on Saturday, Jan. 23 at 1 p.m.

WNCO-AM 1340 will have the live call of both games, with Matt Brubaker on play-by-play.

Ashland is coming off two wins in the "Canton Split" in Week 9 – a 78-64 victory over Walsh at Kates Gymnasium, and a 97-84 shootout win at Malone.

The Eagles come into the week as one of four undefeated women's basketball teams in Division II. They have won 129 of their last 150 games (.860) overall, and their 16 consecutive wins to begin the season marks their second-best start, only trailing the 24 in a row won at the start of the 2012-13 national championship season.

A Look Back At Week Nine

Ashland got off to a slow start at home against the Cavaliers, then turned it on for its 20th consecutive home victory.

Sophomore forward Laina Snyder paced the AU offense with 17 points, while junior guard Kelsey Peare added 11 points, four rebounds and four assists. Sophomore forward Julie Worley came off the bench for 13 points and four rebounds in 19 minutes, while junior guard Alex Henning had 10 points and five boards.

Ashland shot 53.6 percent from the field and 53.8 percent from 3-point range, and had 21 assists on 30 baskets.

The Eagles won at the Pioneers in a contest which featured 27 3-point field goals – a season-high 16 for Malone and a season-high 11 for AU.

Senior guard McKenzie Miller scored a career-high 26 points while adding six rebounds and six assists. Included in that career-high scoring figure was six treys. Sophomore forward Andi Daugherty scored 21 points and had a team-high nine rebounds to go with five assists and three steals, Snyder added 11 points, six boards, six assists, three blocks and two steals, and Peare and Worley each had 10 points.

It was the second game this season in which two Eagles each scored at least 20 points, and the first in which five AU players reached double figures.

Ashland dished out 31 assists as a team (a career-high eight by Henning) – two short of the school's single-game record of 33. That was a major factor in the Eagles shooting 55.7 percent from the field and 45.8 percent from 3-point range.

"Two good wins against two good teams," said Ashland head coach Robyn Fralick. "Playing Walsh at home, we didn't get off to a great start, but I thought we had a really good response to getting down early.

"Then, at Malone, was a lot of made shots. They shot it really well. I thought we did a good job offensively, too. Moving forward, we know we still have some areas to get better at, but it was good to get two wins."

Walsh & Malone Review

Ashland-Findlay

The Oilers have had success against the Eagles at home in recent seasons. Ashland has won 20 straight regular-season games, and the last loss was at Croy Gymnasium, 74-72, on Feb. 12, 2015. Findlay also stopped the 2012-13 national title team's 24-game winning streak to start the campaign at home on Feb. 14, 2013 by a 66-51 count.

Ashland's win over Findlay in 2014-15 came at Kates Gymnasium, 77-66. Four Eagles scored in double figures, led by Snyder's 18 points. Daugherty and guard Rachelle Morrison each added 13 points, and guard Taylor Woods added 11.

AU dished out 25 assists on its 30 field goals, led by Daugherty and Miller with five each. Snyder and Woods each added four helpers.

Ashland-Wayne State

The Eagles and Warriors met twice last season, with AU coming out on top both times.

At home, Ashland knocked off then-fifth-ranked Wayne State, 84-68. Daugherty scored 23 points on 10-of-14 shooting from the field and 3-of-4 shooting from 3-point range, and added seven rebounds, three assists, two blocks and two steals.

Miller came off the bench to score 16 points on 6-of-9 from the field and 4-of-6 from beyond the arc, and added three rebounds and three assists. Snyder ended with 15 points, 13 rebounds and three assists.

On the road, the Eagles were an 80-74 winner over the then-12th-ranked Warriors. Woods had a game-high 22 points, including five 3-pointers, while Daugherty finished with 14 points and a game-high 14 rebounds.

Findlay & Wayne State Preview

AU One Of Four Unbeatens In D-II

Coming into the week, Ashland is one of four undefeated NCAA Division II women's basketball teams:

And The Beat Goes On…

The sophomore forward trio of Snyder, Daugherty and Worley has been with the Eagles for 50 games, and one or more of them have led AU in rebounds in a game in all of them:

Worley Scores Bigger Role In Offense

So far, Worley is enjoying 2016 quite a bit. In six games since the turn of the calendar to a new year, she is averaging 12.0 points in just 15.5 minutes per game, while shooting 70.7 percent from the field.

"Julie's a really good player," Fralick said. "For us, it's great that she can come off the bench and immediately impact the game, both scoring and rebounding, and she's done that really well, especially lately."

Worley is Ashland's fourth-leading scorer overall and top producer off the bench at 7.7 points per contest.

'15-16 Eagles Compare Well To Title Team

Looking at the first 16 games for both the 2015-16 Eagles and the 2012-13 national-title-winning Eagles, this year's team more than holds its own:

Long Undefeated Start Nothing New

The Eagles' 16-0 start is their best since the 2012-13 NCAA Division II national championship team won its first 24 contests.

Ashland has had its share of strong starts to a season:

AU Keeps Winning In The State Up North

Ashland has played the first four of five regular-season GLIAC games in Michigan. The Eagles have enjoyed more than their fair share of success there in recent years, going 28-9 (.757) since the start of the 2010-11 season:

Share And Share Alike

The Eagles racked up 31 assists at Malone - two shy of the program single-game record of 33 set on Feb. 5, 2015 at home against Walsh.

Ashland's combination of high-percentage passing and shooting is no accident. The Eagles have had nine games with at least 25 assists since the start of the 2014-15 season:

"A big emphasis in our program is ball movement, and trusting ball movement and trusting that it's going to find the open person, and the ball's got to have energy, and I thought we did that well," Fralick said. "We got high-percentage shots. People were shot-ready. We work on it a lot."

NCAA Rankings

Through Jan. 17, Ashland has the second-longest current overall winning streak in Division II at 16 games. The Eagles also boast the fourth-best current home winning streak in the country at 20 games.

AU is in the Top 20 in the nation in assists per game (third, 20.6), assist-to-turnover ratio (fourth, 1.40-to-1), field-goal percentage (fourth, 49.1), scoring margin per game (eighth, 21.3 ppg.), rebounding margin per game (14th, 9.6), 3-point field-goal percentage (19th, 38.0) and scoring offense (20th, 78.1 ppg.).

Snyder is tied for fifth in Division II in steals per game at 3.38.

GLIAC Rankings

Through Jan. 17, the Eagles pace the conference in scoring offense, field-goal percentage, assists per game and rebounding margin per game. AU is second in the GLIAC in 3-point field-goal percentage, scoring defense (56.9 ppg.) and field-goal percentage defense (38.7), and third in rebounds per game (39.9).

Snyder leads the league in steals per game, while Miller does the same in assists per game (4.7). Miller also is third in 3-point field-goal percentage (44.7), Snyder is fifth in rebounding (8.8 rpg.), both Daugherty and Snyder are fifth in scoring (15.2 ppg.) and Peare is tied for fifth in assist-to-turnover ratio (2.4-to-1).

AU

WBKB/DS