‘Cats Head to Maine for Conference Opener (ESPN+, Wednesday, 7 P.M. )

Wednesday, January 2

Bangor, Maine

7 PM

University of New Hampshire

Maine

Tickets

Alli Gribbin (Photo by Meghan Murphy)

Photo by: Meghan Murphy

‘Cats Head to Maine for Conference Opener (ESPN+, Wednesday, 7 P.M. )

12/31/2018 2:12:00 PM | Women's Basketball

The Wildcats begin conference play against the Black Bears

DURHAM, N.H. - The University of New Hampshire women's basketball team opens America East play for the 2018-19 season with a game against border rival and defending America East champion Maine on Wednesday at 7 p.m. the Cross Insurance Center in Bangor, Maine.

The Wildcats bring a 3-10 record into the contest. Maine, which was picked as the top team in the league in the preseason coaches poll, is 7-6 and has lost its last four games.

Junior forward Ashley Storey (Cumberland, Maine) is averaging 16.8 points per game to lead the Wildcats and is pulling down 6.1 rebounds per game.

UNH plays Binghamton in its first league home game Saturday, Jan. 5 at 1 p.m.

Tickets for all home games are available by calling 603-862-4000 or at www.unhwildcats.com.

UNH STORYLINES

The Wildcats lost at home to Princeton in their most recent game on Dec. 29.
Storey ranks third in the league in scoring and has paced the Wildcats in 11 of their 13 games.
Coach Maureen Magarity is tied for the No. 3 spot in coaching wins in program history.
She is in her ninth season as head coach of the Wildcats.
Freshman guard Kari Brekke (Appleton, Wisc.) has started every game for UNH.
The Wildcats have seven freshmen on their roster.
Maine junior guard Blanca Millan leads America East in scoring at 18.5 points per game.

THE STATE OF NEW HAMPSHIRE

The Wildcats open the America East portion of their schedule looking to snap a three-game losing streak and get off a to winning start in league play.

Junior forward Ashley Storey averages 16.8 points a game to lead the team. She ranks third in America East in scoring and is among the league leaders in several other categories as well.

UNH is 3-10 on the season.

Head coach Maureen Magarity moved into a tied for the No. 3 spot on the coaching wins list at UNH with a win over Holy Cross. She has a 133-122 record in her eight-plus seasons with the Wildcats.

Magarity is tied with Sue Johnson (133-150 record from 1997 to 2007). Cecilia DeMarco (136-86 from 1977-86) is at No. 2.

Storey has scored at least 20 points in a game six times this season and hit for a career high 23 points in consecutive games against Holy Cross and Central Connecticut in December.

Caroline Soucy had 18 points and 10 rebounds against Holy Cross for her first career double-double and she also had a career best six assists. Maggie Ahearn had 12 points and 11 rebounds in that game for her second double-double of the season and her career.

Storey is second on the team in rebounding (6.1 per game). Maggie Ahearn averages 8.7 points a game and leads in rebounding at 6.6 per game. Kari Brekke leads America East freshmen in scoring at 8.3 points a game, Soucy is at 8 a game and Amanda Torres is at 6.1.

Storey is also among the league leaders in rebounding (fifth at 6.1), field goal percentage (second, 81-for-170 for 47.6 percent) and free throw shooting (third, 48-for-67 for 71.6 percent).

Brekke is fifth in the league in assists at 2.8 per game and is fourth in minutes played at 35.7 per game.

The Wildcats are scoring an average of 54.5 points a game and allowing 66.8 per game.

Magarity led UNH to its best two-year run in the history of the program the last two seasons.

UNH went 19-12 overall and 9-7 in America East last season, following up on 26-6 and 15-1 marks in 2016-17. The Wildcats advanced to the America East semifinals each season. The team's 45 victories over the two years combined were the best two-year win total in school history.

Storey and senior Alli Gribbin, the lone senior on the team, are the Wildcat captains.

MAINE

- Maine lost a pair of games in the Fordham Holiday Classic over the weekend.
- The Black Bears fell to Fordham, 72-64 in overtime, on Saturday and to Chattanooga, 66-61, on Sunday.
- Blanca Millan, a 6-foot-1 junior guard, scored 24 points against Chattanooga.
- Tanesha Sutton, a 5-foot-10 senior guard, had 17 points and 11 rebounds for her eighth career double-double vs. Chattanooga.
- Maine won the America East regular season and tournament titles last year.
- The tournament title was its first since 2004.
- Millan was named the Most Outstanding Player of the league tournament.
- She was also first-team All Conference.
- Sutton was named second-team All Conference.
- The Black Bears have lost their last four games.
- They won five straight before that.
- They won at North Carolina, 85-73, at Harvard , 67-60, and vs. Brown, 102-96 in overtime, during the win streak.
- Millan leads the league in scoring (18.5 points per game).
- Sutton leads the league in rebounding (7.5 per game).
- Sophomore guard Dor Saar is second in the league in assists (5.2 per game).
- Millan leads the team in three-pointers with 29, Saar has 21 and senior guard Parise Rossignol 20.
- The Black Bears have made 103 three-pointers. UNH has 51.
- Maine leads the series 53-32 and has won the last four games.
- The Black Bears beat the Wildcats, 64-48, in the tournament semifinals last year in Portland.
- Amy Vachon, a 2000 graduate of Maine, is in her second full season as head coach.
- She was a two-time captain at Maine and helped the team to four straight NCAA tournament appearances.
- Maine finished 23-10 last year.

HOME COOKING

The Wildcats are 3-3 in Lundholm Gymnasium this season.

Only two of UNH's eight games in November were at home. In contrast, the Wildcats played four of their five December games in Lundholm.

The Wildcats play their first home league game against Binghamton on Saturday, Jan. 5 at 1 p.m.

Tickets for all home games are available by calling 603-862-4000 or at www.unhwildcats.com.

HONORS FOR KARI

Kari Brekke was named America East Rookie of the Week for her performances the week of Dec. 3-10.

Brekke averaged 7.5 points and six assists per game in a pair of Wildcat wins.

Brekke had nine points and doubled her career high with eight assists in UNH's 74-62 win over Holy Cross on Dec. 9 in Lundholm. She made two of her four three-point field goal attempts in the game. She has a team-high 20 three-point field goals this season.

Brekke had six points and four assists in UNH's 68-44 win over the University of New England on Dec. 6.

The Rookie of the Week honors for Brekke were the first America East weekly honors earned by a Wildcat this season.

RAINING TREYS

The Wildcats made 10 of the 16 three-point shots they attempted against Holy Cross, their highest total for made threes in seven years.

The last time the Wildcats had as many as 10 three-pointers was Dec. 3, 2011 when they hit 12 in a loss to Harvard.

Ashley Storey made all three of the three-pointers she took against Holy Cross. Caroline Soucy also made three and Kari Brekke had a pair. Maggie Ahearn and Alli Gribbin each made one three-pointer in the game.

ASHLEY'S STOREY

Ashley Storey had hit the 20-point mark in a game once in her career coming into the season. She's done it six times this year, including four times in a row from the Brown game through the Bryant game. She had 21 points against Brown, matched her career high with 22 points against Sacred Heart and Northeastern and had 20 against Bryant. She set a new career high with 23 points against Holy Cross and matched that, too, against Central Connecticut State.

Storey, who missed all of last season while she rehabilitated from surgeries, added a career-best 12 rebounds against Sacred Heart for the second double-double of her career.

Her first double-double (13 points, 10 rebounds) came against Stony Brook on Jan. 4, 2017.

Storey also leads the team with 2.2 steals per game.

"She's just so long and she moves really well," said coach Maureen Magarity. "Her arms are so long. Someone will think they have an easy pass into the post and she'll get in there and deflect it."

HOW YOUNG IS YOUNG?

So just how young are these Wildcats?

UNH has one senior on the roster with three juniors, two sophomores and seven freshmen.

The average age of the Wildcats on opening day, Nov. 9, was 19 years, eight months and 12 days.

FOR STARTERS

Juniors Ashley Storey and Caroline Soucy, sophomores Maggie Ahearn and Amanda Torres and freshman Kari Brekke started each of the first four games of the season for the Wildcats.

The five starters had a total of 26 starts as Wildcats going into the season. Storey started 17 games in the 2015-16 season and Torres started nine games last season.

By contrast, UNH's five starters in its final game last March had a total of 273 starts between them.

THE COACH

Maureen Magarity, in her ninth year as head coach, has led UNH to winning seasons in each of the last two and four of the last five seasons.

She guided the team to a record-smashing mark of 26-6 overall and 15-1 in America East in 2016-17. The 26 wins were three more than the Wildcats had ever won in a season and the league record was the team's best ever and earned the school's first America East women's basketball regular season championship.

Along the way, the team set a school record with 13 consecutive wins.

UNH went 19-12 overall and 9-7 in the league last year. The 45-18 overall record over the last two seasons was the top mark for any two-year stretch in program history.

Magarity has a 133-122 overall record and pulled into a tie for third place in all-time wins at UNH with the victory against Holy Cross. She is three wins out of the No. 2 spot on the list.

Sue Johnson (133-150 record from 1997 to 2007) is tied with Magarity in the No. 3 spot in wins. Cecilia DeMarco (136-86 from 1977-86) is at No. 2. Kathy Sanborn (170-126 from 1986-97) is at the top of the list.

JACKIE CAME BACK

Acclaimed author and former UNH basketball captain Jackie MacMullan, '82, signed copies of her latest book, "Basketball: A Love Story" before the Holy Cross game.

The book was inspired by the ESPN series of the same name and is in the form of an oral history and includes interviews with well over 100 of the biggest names in basketball, from Bill Russell and Bob Cousy to Larry Bird, from Rebecca Lobo to LeBron James and Kevin Durant.

MacMullan donated $5 from each book purchased to the UNH women's basketball program.

DOUBLING UP

The Bryant game was the first time UNH had five players in double figures in a game since a 71-43 win over Sacred Heart on Dec. 18, 2016.

Ashley Storey had 20 points, Kari Brekke 16, Maggie Ahearn 14, Amanda Torres 13 and Caroline Soucy 10 against Bryant.

Against Sacred Heart two years ago, Storey with 12 points and Soucy with 10 were among the players in double figures. The others were Carlie Pogue with 16, Kat Fogarty with 15 and Aliza Simpson with 10.

Alli Gribbin blocked five shots against Bryant. Pogue was the last Wildcat to block five shots in a game. She did it in a 58-51 win over UMass Lowell on Jan. 14, 2016.

THE FRONTCOURT

Ashley Storey, 6-foot-3, returns to lead the team in the frontcourt. Storey started 17 games her freshman year and was named to the America East All Rookie team after averaging 5.4 points and 3.4 rebounds She averaged 4.9 points and 4 rebounds as a sophomore before missing last season.

"We expect a lot from Ashley," Magarity said. "She's come back much stronger and on the court she hasn't missed a beat. We're going to rely on her to rebound and score. She can score in a lot of different ways and can run the floor very well for a big kid."

Sophomore Maggie Ahearn, 6-foot-2, sat out last season after transferring to UNH from Providence College. She played five games as a freshman at Providence.

Storey and Ahearn are joined up front by three freshmen: 6-foot Faith Bonett, 6-foot-2 Ivy Gogolin and 6-foot-3 Mary Foster.

THE BACKCOURT

Sophomore Amanda Torres, 5-foot-7, is the lone returning starter from last season.

"Amanda had a great freshman year and gained a lot of valuable experience when she ended up as the starting point guard," Magarity said. "She needs to step up even more with her leadership this year. She pushes the ball in transition and gets the team going. She's very aggressive off the bounce and her first step is really quick and her outside shooting continues to improve."

Alli Gribbin, a 5-foot-11 senior captain, junior Caroline Soucy, 5-foot-9, and junior Sarah Clement, 5-foot-8, are the upper classmen in the backcourt.

The freshmen guards are 5-foot-6 Kari Brekke, 5-foot-9 Kali Grimm, 5-foot-10 Mariah Gonzalez and 5-foot-5 Sarah Serbascewicz.

FIRST TIME FOR EVERYTHING

UNH played Minnesota and North Dakota State for the first time to open the season.

The Wildcats played in front of a sold-out crowd of 14,625 at Minnesota as the Golden Gophers celebrated the return of former school and WNBA standout Lindsay Whalen as head coach.

The opening weekend was not the first time UNH teams had squared off with the Golden Gophers and North Dakota State Bison.

Among the encounters:

The UNH women's hockey team beat Minnesota, 4-1, in the semifinals of the American Women's College Hockey Alliance tournament in 1998.
The Wildcats went on to win the AWCHA title, before the NCAA sponsored the event, with a 4-1 win over Brown.
The Minnesota men's hockey team beat UNH, 5-1, in the NCAA championship game in 2003 in Buffalo.
The UNH football team fell at North Dakota State in the semifinals of the NCAA Division I FCS tournament on Dec. 20, 2013.
The Bison went on to win the national championship. They have won six of the last seven FCS national titles.

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