University of Northern Iowa
South Dakota State
Panthers look to right the ship in their first home game since November 12
12/7/2023 4:18:00 PM | Women's Basketball
In their first home matchup in 27 days, the Panthers will matchup with the Jackrabbits of SDSU.
UNI (1-6 / 0-0 MVC) vs. South Dakota State (4-3 / 0-0 Summit)
- 2 p.m. CT | Dec. 9
- Cedar Falls, Iowa | McLeod Center
- ESPN+
- Panther Sports Radio Network (Chris Kleinhans-Schulz: Play-by-Play)
CEDAR FALLS, Iowa --- The UNI women's basketball team laces them up for the first time in the McLeod Center since a November 12 meeting with the Iowa Hawkeyes as they get set to face off with the Jackrabbits of South Dakota State.
This will be the 17th meeting between the Panthers and the Jackrabbits dating back to their first meeting in 1979. When these two teams met last season, South Dakota State took home an 80-69 victory. In that game, the Panthers took on a Jackrabbits team that was receiving votes for the top-25 poll. Northern Iowa returns 59 of the 69 points scored from the matchup a season ago with Emerson Green, Grace Boffeli, and Maya McDermott combining for 46 points in the contest.
UNI is coming off a loss to RV/#25 Creighton which saw the Bluejays tie a program record with 115 points in their 115-62 victory. In that matchup, Taryn Wharton led the Panthers with a career-high 16 points. Ellie Foster scored her first points of the season against Creighton with back-to-back threes in the fourth quarter. That matchup was Maya McDermott's 100th career game for the Panthers. She is also one of just eight players to be perfect from the free throw line in the conference shooting a perfect 9-9 from the line. Guard Taryn Wharton currently ranks second in the conference with 3.5 assists per turnover.
Forward Grace Boffeli is 15 rebounds away from breaking into the top-10 on the Panther all-time rebounding list. She sits with 685 rebounds, just shy of Julie Street's (1984-94) 700 career rebounds. She is also 69 points shy of crossing the 1,000-point threshold. She would become the 27th Panther to accomplish that feat.
South Dakota State is coming off a loss to No. 21-ranked Washington State. That matchup saw a close 69-64 final in favor of Washington State. The loss snapped the Jacks' 16-game home win streak that dated back to November of last season. The scoring for the Jackrabbits in that matchup was led by Paige Meyer with 23 points, two shy of her career-high. The junior guard is second in scoring on the team after playing four of the seven matchups this season. Through seven games, sophomore forward Brooklyn Meyer is heads and shoulders ahead of the pack with 125 total points, 60 points ahead of Paige Meyer who sits in second with 65. Brooklyn Meyer has added 68 total rebounds and averages 17.9 points and 9.7 rebounds per game.
South Dakota State leads the summit league in multiple categories including blocks per game (5), defensive rebounds per game (29.3), scoring defense (56.1), and defensive three-point percentage (21.4). Defense has been a strong suit for the Jackrabbits this season with the two leading Summit League blockers in the game with Brooklyn Meyer totaling 14 blocks and two per game and senior forward Tori Nelson totaling 13 blocks and 1.86 per game. Meyer also leads the Summit League with 68 total rebounds and 9.7 per game.
The game can be streamed on ESPN+ and can be listened to on the Panther Sports Radio Network.
