The Southwest Minnesota State womens basketball team will look to build on a pair of big games from Bri Stoltzman last weekend when it heads to St. Cloud State and Bemidji State for a pair of Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference road matchups.

Last time out, the Mustangs fell 57-72 against Minnesota Duluth before salvaging a split with a 76-75 win over Concordia-St. Paul on Saturday.

Stoltzman scored 27 points against the Golden Bears on Saturday, including the go-ahead free throw with 43 seconds to play, while also grabbing nine rebounds and dishing out five assists. Sam Wall added another 18 points on 4-of-7 shooting from beyond the arc in the win. Stoltzman’s 16 points in the loss to Duluth were also a team-high and her six rebounds trailed only Madison Gehloff’s eight; yet, poor shooting sunk the Mustangs as they shot 28% from the field while Duluth shot 46% as a group.

The weekend performances lifted Stoltzman’s scoring average to 18.8 points per game — shy of only UMary’s Lexie Schneider’s 20.1 points per game and Northern State’s Madelyn Bragg’s 18.8 points per game in the NSIC — on 47.3% from the field. Wall also ranks 16th in the NSIC with 12.9 points per game on a conference-leading 2.6 makes from beyond the arc per game.

Heading into its final road games of the regular season, SMSU sits in a tie with Northern State and UMary for second place in the NSIC with a 13-5 conference record (15-9 overall). After a split against a pair of teams right behind them in the standings (Concordia and Duluth are both 13-6 in conference play), St. Cloud presents another consequential matchup with a 12-6 conference record.

While the Mustangs and Huskies are neck-and-neck in the conference standings, they didn’t look like a pair of evenly matched teams when they last met in Marshall on Jan. 6. The Mustangs ran away with a lopsided 79-55 win over St. Cloud, holding the Huskies to 34.5% shooting from the field while shooting 54.1% themselves.

Stoltzman, Wall and Peyton Blandin led the team on the offensive end with 17, 16 and 15 points respectively. Wall and Blandin each knocked down a trio of trifectas. On the defensive end, Gehloff led SMSU with a pair of steals, a pair of blocks and a team-high seven rebounds. Ashley Sawicki led St. Cloud with 10 points and eight rebounds in the loss.

The Huskies’ 44-point loss was far and away their largest margin of defeat this season, with the second-biggest loss coming in a 71-47 loss at Minnesota State. Since they were defeated by the Mavericks, however, St. Cloud has won five straight games. They won each of the first four games of the streak by double digits before holding off a late rally by Minot State for a 57-54 win on Saturday. Alana Zarneke led the Huskies with 15 points while making five of her seven attempts from 3-point range in the win.

While St. Cloud doesn’t have the most potent offense — their 63.5 points per game rank eighth in the NSIC compared to SMSU’s second-ranked 75.0 mark — their defense more than compensates. They’ve held opponents to a league-best 57.8 points per game on 39.7% shooting from the field. SMSU’s 67.6 points allowed per game and their 42.6% opponent field goal percentage both rank 14th out of 15 teams.

A big part of why St. Cloud State’s defense has been so effective is its ability to create extra possessions. The Huskies’ plus-2.64 turnover margin trails only Minnesota State’s plus-12.92 mark while SMSU is fourth in the conference at plus-0.79. The Huskies’ 1.03:1 assist-to-turnover ratio is also a league-best.

Sawicki and Morgan Draheim lead St. Cloud defensively with 1.3 blocks per game and 1.8 steals per game respectively, ranking fifth and ninth in the NSIC. Sawicki’s 7.1 rebounds per game also rank fifth in the conference. For the Mustangs, Stoltzman’s 1.9 steals per game put her eighth in the conference while Hannah Parsley also ranks 13th in the conference.

Jada Eggebrecht is the only Huskie in the top 25 NSIC scorers, averaging 12 points per game this season.

After they do battle with the Huskies, the Mustangs will take on Bemidji State. The Beavers’ 3-15 conference record puts them 14th in the conference standings this season but all four wins have come in the last two weeks and change. While Bemidji carried an eight-game losing streak into February, they’ve won three of their four games since the start of the month, each of which came by double digits.

Last week, the Beavers fell 64-50 against Northern State before bouncing back for an 87-70 win over Minnesota Crookston. Alyssa Hill tied Amme Sheforgen with a team-high 13 points in the loss to Northern State. Against Crookston, Hill scored a game-high 28 points with 13 rebounds while Sheforgen added another 17 points.

When the Beavers and Mustangs last met, SMSU withstood a third-quarter rally to pull out an 86-72 win behind Stoltzman’s 25 points and five assists. Hill led the Beavers with 16 points on perfect 8-of-8 shooting in the loss.

Hill has led the Beavers’ offense thus far with 13.1 points per game, ranking 14th in the NSIC, on a 52.9% effective field goal percentage. She’s the only Beaver averaging double figures with the team scoring 58 points per game on the season.

The Beavers have struggled with rebounding for much of the year, ranking 12th in the NSIC with a minus-5.1 margin. SMSU’s plus-2.0 mark ranks sixth in the conference. Sheforgen leads the Beavers on the glass with 5.3 rebounds per game, good for 19th in the NSIC, while Stoltzman, Parsley and Gehloff all rank in the top 25 of the conference. Sheforgen’s 0.9 blocks per game are also 13th in the NSIC.

The Mustangs’ game against St. Cloud State is scheduled to begin at 5:30 p.m. in Halenbeck Hall. Tip-off against Bemidji State is slated for 3:30 p.m. on Saturday. A radio broadcast of the game can be found at 105.1 FM KARL while live video and stats are available online at SMSUmustangs.com.