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SALT LAKE CITY – The fifth-ranked Westminster College women's basketball team begins the 2012-13 season this weekend by playing host to the Westminster Fall Classic. Westminster will play three games, starting on Thursday at 4 p.m. versus The Master's (Calif.). They then face No. 12 Biola (Calif.) at 6 p.m. on Friday and College of Idaho on Saturday at 6 p.m. Every game of the Fall Classic will be played in the Behnken Field House on the campus of Westminster College.
Every game of the event will have live stats available as well as being streamed live on Griffins TV. Links for both of these features can be found at WestminsterGriffins.com. The three Westminster games will also be broadcast live locally on Comcast 6.
Griffin Notebook
The Griffins begin the season after going 23-9 in 2010-11 and advancing to the second round of the NAIA national Championships. The four-time defending Frontier Conference champions bring back eight players from last season's squad, including leading scorer
Nicole Yazzie. Fellow starters
Allie Eastman and Cydney Tibitts are also back for the Griffins this season.
Conference Tabs Yazzie
In a preseason poll of the Frontier Conference coaches, Yazzie was selected as the Preseason co-Player of the Year. The senior guard was a Third Team All-American last season after averaging a team-best 13.3 points per game and making 63 three-pointers. Yazzie has scored in double figures 70 times during her career and has reached that mark in the last 16 games she has played entering the season.
Climbing the Charts
Starting her senior season, Yazzie ranks in the Westminster career top 10 in 12 statistical categories. She begins the year with 1,277 career points to rank fifth in school history. She needs just 19 triples to move into first all-time at Westminster with 239 and she is also 19 assists away from becoming the second Griffins to reach 400 for a career.
Tracking Tibbitts
Tibbitts is back for her senior season after averaging 10.8 points per game as a junior. The forward averaged a team-high 7.4 rebounds per game last season and recorded six double-doubles. She also led the team with 18 blocked shots and had 25 steals despite missing 11 games to start the year.
Eyes on Eastman
Eastman is fully recovered from a knee injury and should be a key component to the offense this season. She averaged 5.1 points per game last season, but she made 26 threes and had 22 steals. She averages nine points per game in her career and averaged over 11 points per game in each of her first two seasons with the club. Eastman currently ranks ninth in school history with 758 points scored.
Preseason Favorites
Westminster was picked to win the Frontier Conference this season according to a poll of the league's coaches. Westminster received 64 points and eight first-place votes in the poll to take the top spot. The Griffins are the four-time defending regular season champions. Defending conference tournament champion Lewis-Clark State (Idaho) was picked to finish second in the league with 52 points. Carroll (Mont.) received one first-place vote and finished third in the poll with Montana Western placing fourth
In the Polls
Westminster received a No. 5 ranking in the 2012-13 NAIA Division I Women's Basketball Coaches' Preseason Top 25 Poll. The No. 5 ranking is the highest for a Westminster team in school history. The Griffins received a No. 8 national ranking on three occasions during the 2010-11 season to establish a school-best. The previous high for a preseason ranking was the No. 9 that the team received prior to the start of last season.
Comcast to Carry Griffin Home Games
The Westminster College Athletics Department is pleased to announce that all Westminster men's and women's home basketball games will be broadcast live on Comcast Utah Channel 6. The games will then be available on Xfinity Utah On Demand that same week. Comcast Utah Channel 6 is available to all Comcast subscribers in the following Utah counties: Box Elder, Cache, Davis, Salt Lake, Sanpete, Summit, Tooele, Utah and Weber along with Franklin, Idaho. Mike Lageschulte and Lance Barton return as the broadcast team for Westminster basketball. Lageschulte enters his third season as the play-by-play voice of Griffins. Barton begins his second year as an analyst.
Looking Ahead
Next week the Griffins hit the road to Louisiana for two games. They face Southern-New Orleans (La.) on Nov. 15 at 5 p.m. and then face Southern (La.) on Nov. 17 at 11 a.m. Westminster isn't back in the Behnken Field House until the Frontier Conference opener on Dec. 1 against Montana Western.
