SIOUX FALLS – After a huge home sweep, University of Sioux Falls Women's Basketball returns to the road for a weekend trip to northwest Minnesota. The Cougars (12-2, 8-2 NSIC) open the weekend road swing at Bemidji State (4-10, 1-9 NSIC) on Friday Jan. 13 with tipoff scheduled for 6 p.m. Closing their trip, USF will face Minnesota Crookston (4-10, 4-6 NSIC) on Saturday, Jan. 14 at 4 p.m. The Cougars return to the Stewart Center for a four-game home stand upon the conclusion of this weekend's road trip.
 
How to watch/listen
All of USF's home games and NSIC contests will be streamed live via Stretch Internet and are available at USFCougars.com/watch. Veteran broadcaster Tom Frederick will broadcast Friday's games KWSN AM 1230 or FM 98.1 and Saturday's contests on FM 107.9 with pregame starting 15 minutes prior to tip-off each night. Links for all USF home games are available at USFCougars.com/livestats and links to road contest live stats are available on the USF Women's Basketball schedule.
 
Cougars sweep at home, knock off No. 14 Winona State in defensive thriller
Riding the momentum of a big win over crosstown rival Augustana on New Year's Eve, USF Women's Basketball added to their season's accomplishments with a season sweep of Upper Iowa and a thrilling victory over then-No. 14 Winona State to close the weekend. The Cougar defense was special in both wins, holding their opponents to a combined 32.7 percent shooting and an average of 46 points per game. USF forced 34 turnovers and turned them into 37 points in the two games. Four different Cougars scored in double figures against Upper Iowa, led by Madi Robson's 14 points, and Jacey Huinker picked up nine offensive boards to finish with a career-high 13 total rebounds, as USF held the Peacocks to 14 points in the second half of a 74-41 win. In a rematch of last season's last-second heartbreaker, Sioux Falls put the clamps on one of the most efficient offenses in the league, limiting Winona State to 51 points, nearly 20 points below their season average, and eked out a 52-51 win over the top-15 ranked Warriors. No Cougar scored in double figures, but Huinker's steal led to a Robson layup in the final minute to provide the go-ahead bucket for USF. Huinker and reserve guard Brooke Smith led the Cougar with nine points while Sam Knecht kept her double-digit rebound average alive with nine against WSU and 16 for the weekend.
 
Series history – Bemidji State – USF leads 4-0
Since commencing annual regular season competition with Bemidji State when Sioux Falls joined the NSIC in 2012-13, the Cougars have remained perfect against the Beavers in all four contests, bt not without a few close calls. In the first matchup, USF was pushed to overtime before winning 82-70, and after a nine-point victory in 2014, the Cougars needed a Teagan Molden buzzer-beater to top BSU, 70-69, in 2015. Last season, the Cougars rolled Bemidji State 87-60 with Sam Knecht scoring 26 points. Adding intrigue to the series, Bemidji State is led by head coach Chelsea DeVille, who is in her second year at the helm of the Beaver women's basketball program, and spent her previuos seven seasons as an assistant to USF head coach Travis Traphagen.
 
Series history – Minnesota Crookston – USF leads 3-2
Heading into last season, USF trailed Minnesota Crookston in the series that began in the 2012-13 season, but the Cougars secured two victories, including one en route to the NSIC Tournament title to pull ahead in the al-time series, 3-2. Minnesota Crookston earned the first win in the series, dropping the Cougars, 76-59, in Crookston in 2013. USF evened the series with a 10-point victory in 2014, but the Golden Eagles clipped USF the following season with a 71-62 victory again in Crookston. Last season, the Cougars used 30 points from Taylor Varsho for a 64-55 regular-season win, then Sam Knecht posted 22 point in USF's 75+62 win over UMC in the NSIC Tournament quarterfinals. Since starting the series in 2012-13, the Cougars are 0-2 in Lysaker Gymnasium, the home floor of the Golden Eagles.
 
Traphagen breaks coaching wins record, has won two thirds of games at USF
With the nail-biting victory over Winona State, head coach Travis Traphagen secured his 168th coaching victory at USF, breaking Katie Dailey's record. In his ninth season as head coach of the USF Women's Basketball program, Traphagen owns a 168-84 record, winning exactly two thirds of his games coached at USF, a .667 winning percentage. He has taken the Cougars to both the NAIA Elite Eight and the NCAA Division II national tournament. A 1999 graduate of Black Hills State, Traphagen owns a league record of 87-65, combining four years in each the Great Plains Athletic Conference and the Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference with USF serving as an independent during the 2011-12 season, their transition season to NCAA Division II.
 
Cougar defensive quick hits

• In league games only, USF has the top defense in the NSIC in three different categories
• USF boasts the top scoring defense with opponents averaging a 52.9 points per game, nearly three points fewer than second
• In addition to limiting opponents to the lowest scoring average, USF has held their 10 NSIC opponents to a 33.1 percent shooting mark, tops in the league
• After holding their opponents to 6-32 shooting on threes this past weekend, USF's three-point field goal defense is first in the league with opponents shooting 26.0 percent
• In all games this season, USF owns the top defensive rating among the NSIC programs, boasting a 74.438rating, which translates to allowing 74.38 points per 100 possessions, more than six points better than the next best defensive rating in the league
• The Cougars have 106 steals in 10 league games, second in the league, and the third-best turnover margin with a +5.50 average through eight games
• Sioux Falls has three Cougars in the top eight of the league in steals per game, led by Brooke Smith in fifth at 2.1 per game (21 total), and Madi Robson and Alyson Johnsen tied for seventh with 20 total steals, a 2.0 average.
• Sam Knecht has 17 blocked shots in league play, a 1.7 average per game that has her ranked fifth in the league

 
USF picked to finish ninth overall in NSIC, sixth in loaded south division
After finishing a program-best second place in 2015-16 and rolling to the NSIC Tournament title, Sioux Falls was slotted to finish ninth in the NSIC preseason coaches' poll released two weeks before the season kicked off. USF collected 108 total points in the 16-team poll while grabbing 24 points in the eight-team division, which placed them sixth. Winona State was the favorite in the overall poll, earning 201 points with the most first-place votes (7). Northern State (3), Augustana (4) and Minnesota State (2) all received first-place votes and were slotted second, third, and sixth, respectively, in the overall poll.