UMD Men’s Basketball Preaching Offense While the Bulldog Women Preach Defense Ahead of Crookston Game

Both squads are 1-0 in conference play.

DULUTH, Minn.- The UMD men’s basketball team already has seven games under their belts this season.

And so far that’s resulted in the team being at the top of the NSIC North Division.

UMD, who is 5-2, will look to add another conference win Wednesday when they take on Minnesota Crookston. A team the Bulldogs have won their last 12 games against.

Head Coach Justin Wieck says Wednesday’s matchup is all about getting the offense back on track.

“We’ve struggled offensively a little bit, actually putting the ball in the basket. If you would’ve asked me in October, I thought offense might be the side where we saw a lot of success in. We have a lot of guys that can really shoot it and score the ball. So it’s kind of been a flip these first seven games of kind of what I expected. But it does give me a lot of excitement knowing that we have so much room to improve on the offensive end,” said Wieck.

The Bulldogs and Golden Eagles get things going at 5:30 on Wednesday.

Same can be said for the women’s team as they have also won their last 12 contests against the Golden Eagles.

UMD also enters the game on a two-game winning streak as they’ve recently defeated Northern Michigan and Bemidji State.

Head Coach Mandy Pearson says a big reason for their success as of late has been the team’s defensive play.

UMD is currently 9th in the conference as they’ve allowed an average of 68 points per game.

Pearson added that will once again be a key when facing Crookston.

“Crookston is really good transition offensive wise. So they push the ball pretty hard in transition. They have a guard, Emma Miller, who’s taking 21 shots a game, which is quite a lot of shots. And they’ve got some other players around her who can hit some shots and they’re going to do some ballscreen stuff. So we have to be really good in helpside. We have to get in and out of helpside very quickly in order to defend them well,” said Pearson.

Tip-off is following the men at 7:30 on Wednesday.