ISU to Face Huskers in Quarterfinals

03.07.2007 | Women's Basketball

By: Iowa State University

OKLAHOMA CITY, Okla. - The Iowa State women's basketball team advanced to the quarterfinals of the Phillips 66 Big 12 Tournament with a 57-45 win over Kansas State in the first round at the Cox Convention Center in Oklahoma City, Okla. ... the Cyclones will face the fourth seed, Nebraska, at 2:30 p.m. Wednesday in the tournament quarterfinals ... ISU has won its last six straight and seven out of the last eight ... the Cyclones have now advanced to the quarterfinals over the last four years ... ISU will try to earn its first semifinal berth since 2002 ... senior Megan Ronhovde became the 18th player in ISU history to record 1,000 career points, eclipsing the mark at Baylor ... ISU head coach Bill Fennelly earned his 250th victory at the helm of the Cyclone program with the win over Missouri on Feb. 4 and his 400th career win in the season opener vs. Cal State Fullerton ... the Cyclones are now 23-7 overall and finished 10-6 in the Big 12 to tie Nebraska for fourth place in the final Big 12 standings ... the Cyclones claimed their eighth 20-win season in school history and the seventh under Fennelly ... Iowa State has now reached 23 wins in seven seasons in school history, all under Fennelly ... ISU finished the home season with a 15-1 record at Hilton, while ISU was 5-6 in true road games ... the Cyclones wrapped up the non-conference slate at 12-1 overall ... Iowa State split contests with Nebraska this season, falling 62-49 in Lincoln without the services of senior All-America candidate Lyndsey Medders, and winning 64-53 in Ames on Senior Night ... Medders missed games at Nebraska and Baylor and played limited minutes against Missouri due to a minor concussion ... in the Cyclones' win over Loyola Marymount, Medders broke the Iowa State career assist record and now has 687 ... Medders is ISU's leading scorers with 12.4 points per game ... Nicky Wieben is ISU's second leading scorer with 12.2 ppg and has 1.8 blocks per game ... Toccara Ross continues to lead the Cyclones on the glass with 7.7 rpg.

On the Tube

The quarterfinal games of the Phillips 66 Big 12 Tournament on Wednesday, March 7, including ISU's game vs. Nebraska, will be televised nationally by Fox Sports Net (cable channel 40 in Ames), check your local listings ... Kevin Eschenfelder (play-by-play) and Debbie Antonelli (color) will be calling the action.

On the Air

The game will be broadcast live on the Cyclone Radio Network (1430 AM in Ames) ... every game is broadcast live on the internet at Cyclones.com ... broadcasts will be streamed by Yahoo! Sports and will cost $4.95 per month, which will include broadcasts of football, men's basketball and the Coaches shows.

Last Time Out

? The fifth-seeded Iowa State women's basketball team earned a first-round win over No. 12 seed Kansas State, 57-45, in the Phillips 66 Big 12 Tournament Tuesday afternoon at the Cox Convention Center ... Iowa State defeated the Wildcats for the third time this season, and knocked off KSU in the league tournament for the first time in six tries ... sophomore Nicky Wieben led the Cyclones with 18 points on 7-of-12 shooting, to go with six rebounds and a pair of blocked shots ... senior Lyndsey Medders had 12 points and six assists, while Toccara Ross also finished in double digits with 10 points and four boards over just 17 minutes ... Kansas State tied the game at 26-all to open the second half and tied it again twice more before ISU finally began to build a cushion ... Alison Lacey, Wieben and Medders hit three straight treys for the Cyclones to open the ISU lead to eight points, 47-39, with six minutes to go ... Kansas State cut the margin back to six points on two occasions, but Wieben got a conventional three-point play to give the Cyclones a 54-43 lead with 2:34 to go and ISU held off the Wildcats the rest of the way ... Iowa State finished the game shooting 41.3 percent from the floor, after a 52 percent showing in the second period ... the Cyclones held Kansas State to 27.3 percent shooting for the contests and just 15 percent from beyond the arc ... the Wildcats outrebounded the Cyclones, 39-37. Iowa State led 24-20 at halftime despite shooting just 28.6 percent from the field and committing nine first-half turnovers ... the Cyclone defense, however, held the Wildcats to just 24 percent over the first 20 minutes, including going 0-of-13 to start the game ... ISU was 1-of-7 from three-point range, while Kansas State was 1-of-13 for the first period ... the Cyclones got out to an 8-1 start over the first seven and a half minutes of the contest ... Kansas State cut ISU's initial lead to one, 8-7, but ISU never trailed in the opening period ... the Cyclones took a 16-10 advantage on a pair of Heather Ezell free throws ... but KSU once again cut it to a single point, 16-15, with 2:44 to go ... the Cyclones opened a seven-point lead, 24-17 on free throws by Amanda Nisleit to make it 24-17, but Kimberly Dietz hit the Wildcats' only trey of the first half with two seconds on the clock to cut the halftime margin to four points.

About the Cyclones

Iowa State has used six different starting lineups this season ... ISU is 23-7 on the year and finished 10-6 in the Big 12 ... ISU was 15-1 at Hilton Coliseum this year ... ISU is outscoring opponents by a margin of +8.4, and is averaging 68.1 ppg ... the Cyclones are shooting 42.3 percent from the field and 33.6 percent from three-point range ... ISU has outrebounded opponents with a +3.8 margin ... Iowa State is in its 34th season of women's basketball and holds a 493-470 overall record ... the 2006-07 Iowa State roster has 14 active players on it, the largest number on an ISU roster to start the season since 2001-02 when the Cyclones had 15 players ... the Cyclones are coming off an 18-13 season in which they made it to the second round of the WNIT for their ninth postseason appearance in the last 10 years.

The Series

The Huskers hold a 36-30 advantage in the all-time series with Iowa State after splitting the series this season ... Iowa State is 3-0 all-time against the Huskers at the Big 12 Tournament ... the Cyclones won 10 straight meetings between 2000 and 2003, but the two teams have split home-and-away games every season since ... Nebraska won the first meeting of the season with the Cyclones, 62-49, in Lincoln ... Lyndsey Medders missed the game due to a minor concussion she suffered in the shootaround before the game ... ISU won 64-53 in Ames on Senior Night, to continue the trend of home team wins.

Season Reset

Iowa State's first-round tournament win over Kansas State was ISU's first over the Wildcat in six tries at the Big 12 Tournament ... ISU's 72-68 win at Texas Tech was the first in school history for the Cyclones in Lubbock ... ISU has reached 23 wins for just the seventh time in school history, all under the direction of head coach Bill Fennelly ... ISU has now won six straight and seven out of its last eight, including its last two on the road ... the Cyclones carry a 27 RPI as of March 6, and have a 4-4 record against teams in the current RPI top 50 according to collegerpi.com, and a 10-5 mark against teams in the top 80 ... with a 61-54 win over then-13th ranked Texas A&M, Iowa State improved to 3-3 on the season against ranked teams, 39-104 all-time and 33-45 against top 25 squads under Fennelly.

ISU in the Big 12 Tourney

Iowa State finished one Big 12 Northern Division win shy of Nebraska, giving the Huskers the tiebreaker for the fourth seed in the Big 12 Tournament ... ISU is 12-5 in Big 12 Tournament games since 2000 and won back-to-back titles in 2000 and 2001 ... ISU is 5-4 in Big 12 Tournament quarterfinal contests ... ISU has not made it to the semifinals since 2002, where they fell to Baylor 91-83 in Kansas City.

ISU Tidbits

Sophomore Nicky Wieben has scored in double figures in 20 games and has led ISU in scoring in 12 games this season ... Wieben has two double-doubles on the year, while junior Toccara Ross has logged four double-doubles ... Ross has been in double figures in 18 games this years and has led the Cyclones on the glass in 14 contests ... ISU has won four out of its last six contests when being outrebounded ... ISU defeated Kansas State in the Big 12 first round despite a 39-37 deficit on the glass ... Iowa State is 13-2 this season when holding opponents under 60 points, while the Cyclones are 22-2 when scoring 60 points or better.

Trey Bien

Iowa State has made at least one three-pointer in 364 consecutive regular-season games dating back to 1995 ... that streak now ranks second in the nation, as Cleveland State failed to hit a long-range try in their game on Feb. 3, ending its streak at an NCAA record 408 consecutive games and Stanford ended its streak at 403 on Feb. 22 ... Canisius College now unofficially holds the longest current streak at 390 consecutive games ... the ISU school record for three-pointers made in a game is 18 (vs. Missouri, Feb. 19, 2000), which ISU challenged in their game against Virginia Tech, hitting 14-of-27 on the contest.

Streaking

Lyndsey Medders has passed out an assist in every game she has played at Iowa State ... that is a span of 117 consecutive games through four years ... her single-game high was a school-record 16 assists vs. IPFW last season ... she ranks now holds the single-season class records for freshmen, sophomores, juniors and seniors ... she now has 184 this season, rewriting Stacy Frese's senior mark of 165 ... she has only had one game with fewer than three assists this season.

Block Party

Sophomore Nicky Wieben has posted 55 blocked shots on the season and 114 for her career, ranking her second all-time in ISU history ... she needs 41 to tie for first place ... this season Wieben has had three games with five blocks and seven games with three or more.