NCAC Tournament Page

GAMBIER, Ohio – The Kenyon Ladies basketball team, for the 14th time in the last 15 seasons, will host a quarterfinal matchup in the North Coast Athletic Conference Tournament on Tuesday night. Kenyon will welcome Ohio Wesleyan University to Tomsich Arena for a 7 p.m. tip-off.
 
The third-seeded Ladies, who swept OWU during the regular season, will face off against the No. 6 seed Battling Bishops in the conference tournament for the 13th time tomorrow. It is the first contest in the tourney since February 20, 2007 when the Ladies won 55-45. Overall, the postseason series between the two institutions is at a dead draw, 6-6.

 
Kenyon enters the game with a 17-8 overall record including an 11-5 NCAC mark. They have won five of the last six games and seem to be peaking.
 
In those five wins, the Ladies are averaging a little over 71 points per game, shooting 41 percent from the field and nearly 40 percent from three-point range. Defensively, Kenyon has held opponents to 31 percent shooting and given up 54 points per game.
 
Leading the charge for Kenyon is Paige Matijasich. She has scored in double figures every game, the only top-five leader in the NCAC to do that, averaged almost 16 points and pulled down 7.8 rebounds per contest, another top-five mark.
 
Grace Connery has aided the Ladies, too. In the last 10 games, she has reached double-figures five times and connected on 38.5 percent from three. She is currently the top freshman three-point threat in the league, sitting in fourth (37.9).
 
Additionally, Lane Davis ranks in the top-three in both rebounds per game (8.0) and field goal percentage (50.6). Guards Ellie Schaub and Jessica Gerber have had their moments, too. Each have scored in double-figures nearly 10 times while Gerber also leads the NCAC averaging 5.1 assists per game.  
 
Collectively, while Kenyon's offense ranks seventh out of nine in points (60.9), its defense is very formidable. The Ladies are second in the NCAC in field-goal percentage defense (35.4) and third in points allowed (55.7).
 
On the other bench, Ohio Wesleyan brings a 10-15 overall and 5-11 conference record into the quarterfinal game. The visitors from Delaware, Ohio will be looking to win its first NCAC Tournament game since the 2014-15 season when it won two road games against Oberlin and DePauw before falling to Wittenberg in the final. Since then, they are 0-2.
 
Offensively, Devin Hefner's 11.2 points per game ranks tenth in the NCAC. However, she has not played in the last three contests. After that, Tia Karras and Claire Sterling are scoring nearly 11 per game. Sterling has been the leader against Kenyon this year. Despite those two losses in the regular season, she is averaging 18.5 points per game. Sterling is also a stellar rebounder, sitting in fourth in the NCAC (7.7).
 
On the defensive end, OWU has struggled, allowing 66.1 points per game, a mark that is sixth out of ninth in the NCAC. They have also are giving up 40.8 percent shooting to opponents (7th). The Battling Bishops aren't playing well as of late, either. They will be bringing a six-game winless skid into Tomsich.
 
Live coverage of the contest can be found here. As mandated by the conference office, ticket prices for all quarterfinal games will be $7 for adults, $5 for fans with an NCAC Guest Pass and $5 for children and students without an NCAC institution ID. Students who present a valid NCAC institution ID at the gate will be admitted free of charge.