Photo by Jake McNeill: Southwest Minnesota State University guard Peyton Blandin (21) attacks the St. Cloud State University defense during a women’s basketball game on Jan. 6 in Marshall.

The Southwest Minnesota State womens basketball team will head North on Saturday afternoon to take on Minnesota Crookston in search of its 10th consecutive win.

Sam Wall led the Mustangs to a pair of wins over Minnesota State Moorhead and Minot State last weekend. She scored a season-high 24 points in a 74-61 over MSUM, surpassing the 1,000-point mark for her career and becoming the second Mustang to reach 200 3-pointers made after Jenna Borchers. She then doubled down with another 20-point outing against Minot on Saturday, knocking down six 3-pointers in the 80-42 blowout victory.

After the pair of wins, SMSU sits in second place in the Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference with a 9-2 conference record and 11-6 overall. It trails only Minnesota State, which sits at 9-1 in conference play this year. Crookston, meanwhile, is tied with Minnesota Duluth and MSUM for sixth place in the conference at 6-4.

The Golden Eagles split their matchups last weekend with a 77-69 win over Winona State on Friday and a 100-49 loss to Minnesota State on Saturday. Emma Miller and Janie Tormanen combined for 41 points in the win over Winona State while Nicole Hernandez put together an 11-point, 11-rebound double-double. Miller also led the team in scoring against Minnesota State with 17 points on 6-of-18 shooting while Tormanen scored 11 points on a perfect 5-of-5 from the field.

Miller has been the Golden Eagles’ leader in terms of scoring volume all season while Tormanen has led the team in terms of efficiency. Miller is second in the NSIC with an average of 17.6 points per game on 39% from the field and 40% from 3-point range, averaging out to a 45% effective field goal percentage. Tormanen, meanwhile, has averaged 12.4 points per game on a 49% effective field goal percentage.

Hernandez has led the team on the glass this year with 7.1 rebounds per game while Miller adds another 6.9. The duo ranks fifth and ninth respectively in the NSIC in rebounds per game. Tormanen and Olivia Walsh also each average 5.6 and 5.9 respectively.

While the numbers at face value seem to give Crookston an advantage on the glass — Bri Stoltzman has led SMSU with 6.7 rebounds per game to rank 11th in the conference followed by Hannah Parsley at 5.4 — much of the disparity can be attributed to pace of play. The Golden Eagles average 42.5 rebounds per game as a team but have been outrebounded by an average margin of minus-1.6. SMSU, meanwhile, has averaged 37.5 rebounds per game but has outrebounded its opponents by a plus-2.9 margin.

Hernandez has also been a menace in the paint for slashing opponents. She’s averaged a conference-leading 2.4 blocks per game, 0.3 more than the next closest player. While the Mustangs have been finding success in the paint as of late, their ability to shoot the 3-ball minimizes Hernandez’s impact inside. While SMSU and Crookston are the top two teams in the conference in terms of 3-point efficiency — SMSU has shot 35.7% from deep while Crookston clocks in at 34.5% — SMSU runs away as the conference leader in terms of volume. SMSU has attempted 451 3-pointers to Crookston’s 281 and their 161 makes are 52 more than the next closest team, Umary. Wall has made 44 3-pointers on the season while Peyton Blandin has made another 33.

While the Mustangs have thrived on the perimeter, Stoltzman has capitalized on the spacing to average a team-high 18.4 points per game, good for third in the conference, on 46% from the field with a 51% effective field goal percentage. Beyond her shooting, she also leads the Mustangs in assists (3.2 per game), rebounds (6.7 per game) and steals (1.9 per game).

Parsley also notched a career-high 11 rebounds last week against Minnesota State.

The last time the Mustangs reached a double-digit win streak was the 2001-02 season, when an 11-game winning streak took them into the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Tournament, upsetting No. 2 seed North Dakota before falling to No. 4 South Dakota State.

Saturday’s matchup is the Mustangs’ only matchup of the week. Crookston will be on the second day of a back-to-back after taking on Sioux Falls on Friday night. Tip-off on Saturday is slated for 3:30 p.m. A radio broadcast of the game is available on 105.1 KARL while live stats and a video broadcast are available online at SMSUmustangs.com