GCU hosts CBU in New Year's Eve matinee

Saturday, December 31

Phoenix, Ariz.

2 p.m.

Grand Canyon

California Baptist

12/30/2022 4:09:00 PM | Women's Basketball

Lopes face Lancers in conference home opener at 2 p.m.

By: Nick Macdonald

Saturda, Dec. 31 \| 2 p.m. \| GCU Arena \| Phoenix, Ariz.

	CALIFORNIA BAPTIST LANCERS (5-7, 1-0 WAC)	at	GRAND CANYON LOPES (8-4, 0-1 WAC)

WATCH: ESPN+ \| STATS: View

The Lopes return home after a two-game road stretch and host California Baptist in the first conference home contest of the season at GCU Arena.
GCU looks to snap a three-game losing streak. Two of its three losses have come in overtime, most recently a 65-63 defeat at Utah Valley in two overtimes Thursday.
The Lancers defeated UT Arlington 67-61 on Thursday evening to open WAC play 1-0. They have won three of their past four games.
Saturday's game is a rematch of last year's WAC Tournament semifinal in which GCU won 64-60 on March 11.
Saturday marks the first game for junior guard Sydney Palma against her former team. Palma played three seasons at CBU from 2019 to 2022, averaging 6.2 points, 3.3 rebounds and 2.5 assists per game and winning a WAC 3-point shooting percentage title.

GCU ranks first in the country in steals per game (15.5), third in turnovers forced per game (25.5) and seventh in turnover margin (8.9). Against Utah Valley on Thursday, GCU forced 31 turnovers, marking the third game this season — and second on the road — that it has forced 30 or more turnovers.
Junior forward Tiarra Brown has scored in double digits in back-to-back games and seven times this season, as she leads the squad in scoring (10.3 points per game). She is averaging 11.3 points and 6.7 rebounds in her past three games.
Graduate forward Evan Zars is nearing a milestone mark of 1,000 career rebounds. She has 985 for her career and leads the team with 7.7 boards per game, totaling 92 for the season with 38 on offense. Zars has gathered five or more rebounds in 11 of 12 games this season with seven games with nine or more.
Sophomore guard Naudia Evans owns the best assist/turnover ratio in the WAC (2.62 to 1). She leads the team with 3.1 assists per game and has dished out four or more assists six times this season. Averaging 25.5 minutes per game, she only has one game with two or more turnovers with a 34/13 season ratio.
Head coach Molly Miller ranks third in the nation in winning percentage (.857), tallying a 228-38 record in six seasons at Drury and four at GCU. She trails only UConn head coach Geno Auriemma (.884) and LSU head coach Kim Mulkey among active head coaches who have competed in three or more seasons.

Junior guard/forward Tiarra Brown scored a season-best 16 points on 8-of-13 shooting Thursday in GCU's conference opener at Utah Valley. She added seven rebounds, including four offensive, to her stat line.
Brown enters Saturday as the team's leading scorer with 10.3 points per game. She has totaled seven double-figure games, including the past two. The Spanaway, Washington, native has also recorded seven games with five or more rebounds and has grabbed 20 rebounds in the past three games (6-7-7).

GCU Arena, dubbed "The Biggest Party in College Basketball," opened in September of 2011 and has since boasted one of the loudest and most energetic college basketball environments in the country.
Since the 2011-12 season, the Lopes are 118-44 at home with a 29-7 record under Molly Miller. Miller has led the Lopes to back-to-back 12-win seasons at home, going 12-1 in 2020-21 and 12-3 last season.

The Lancers are coming off a win in their WAC home opener Thursday night with a 67-61 defeat of UT Arlington and have won three of its last four games.
CBU owns a 5-2 record in Riverside but an 0-3 mark on the road.
The Lancers rank 11th in the country in free throws attempted per game (23.5) and 12th in free throws made per game (16.3). It attempted 27 free throws Thursday vs. UT Arlington and has attempted 25 or more free throws six times this season, including 50 vs. Northern Arizona on Nov. 16.
The Lancers' top two scorers have missed action recently, with Trinity San Antonio (19.2 points per game) out since Nov. 26 and Chloe Webb (12.7 points per game) out since Dec. 17. Dorcas Wu is third on the team with 12.1 points per game and scored a season-high 18 points with four made 3s vs. UT Arlington.
CBU has three players with 20 or more steals this season, with Webb leading the way with 27 for third in the WAC in steals per game (2.7).

Saturday is a rematch of the WAC semifinal game in Las Vegas on March 11, a game in which GCU prevailed 64-60 to advance to the WAC Tournament championship.
Tiarra Brown had 22 points, six rebounds and five steals while Dominique Phillips had seven rebounds and two points in 10 minutes of the win.
Saturday marks the fourth time the Lopes and Lancers have played each other in the 2022 calendar year, with the previous three meetings coming Feb. 5, Feb. 17 and Mar. 11.

GCU stays home for a pair of conference games next week.
The Lopes tip off Thursday against Tarleton at 6 p.m. and play Saturday against Stephen F. Austin at 2 p.m. Both games will stream on ESPN+.