CALGARY – After four straight games against Manitoba teams to open the season, the Dinos basketball squads turn their attention to the other end of the Canada West geographical spectrum as two Pacific Division opponents come to town.
Friday night the Dinos play host to the Fraser Valley Cascades, while Saturday night the Thompson Rivers WolfPack pays a visit to the Jack. Neither of these two schools has ever recorded a win against the Dinos in their short histories in Canada West.
On the women's side, the Dinos are 3-0 all-time against Fraser Valley and 5-0 in their history against Thompson Rivers. The most recent meetings came last season on the road, when Calgary got past the Cascades 72-54 in Abbotsford, hopped on a bus, and proceeded to blitz the WolfPack 80-55 a night later in Kamloops.
The young Dinos women (3-1) pulled out a pair of key road wins last week against the Manitoba Bisons on the back of a solid performance from fourth-year forward
Ashley Hill. Hill is leading the conference in scoring with 22 points per game and had 23 and 22 over the two nights last weekend in Winnipeg.
Friday night's win was particularly electrifying, when
Megan Lang found rookie
Tilly Ettinger wide open under the hoop with just 11 seconds to play and Ettinger managed to put down the winning points in a 79-77 Dinos win. Saturday night the score was 89-81 in favour of Calgary.
At 3-1, the Dinos sit tied with the Alberta Pandas for top spot in the new Prairie Division, which joined the Central and Great Plains divisions from the 2008-09 season. Fraser Valley, meanwhile, sits 0-2 while Thompson Rivers has yet to lose at 2-0.
The Cascades feature former Dino Jane Meadwell as their top offensive weapon. Meadwell, who started her career at UBC before transferring to the Dinos, left Calgary to return to her native Chilliwack, B.C. after the 2007-08 season. She's averaging 20.5 points per game, third best in Canada West in this young season.
The Dinos men retained their No. 3 national ranking this week after improving to 4-0 with their sweep of the Bisons last weekend. Despite the similarity in the scores, Saturday night was the better effort for the Dinos after they needed a big fourth-quarter effort Friday. After 30 minutes the upstart Bisons were within one point of the powerful Dinos, but Calgary responded to outscore their hosts 28-10 in the final quarter to win going away 86-67.
Saturday night Manitoba pulled within three about four minutes into the second quarter, but the Dinos' lead stretched into double digits moments later and stayed there, with Calgary winning 89-64.
Third-year forward
Tyler Fidler is already on pace for a career season, having led the team in both points and rebounds in three of the first four games of the season. His 20.3 points per game is fifth-best in the conference despite the balanced, spread-out Calgary offence.
The Dinos had little trouble with these two Pacific Division teams last season, winning easily 86-58 at Fraser Valley before putting up triple digits with their 103-57 win at Kamloops over the WolfPack the following night.
The Dinos will be road warriors to close out the first half of the season, with back-to-back challenging weekends away from the Jack before Christmas. Next week Calgary heads to Saskatoon to play the No. 2 Huskies women and No. 7 Huskies men for a two-game set, the only meeting of the year between the traditional rivals. The following weekend, the Dinos head the other way for a Lower Mainland swing trip. For the women, the No. 1-ranked defending national champion Simon Fraser Clan await in the opener with the lowly Trinity Western Spartans to follow. The men face the same two teams, but the game against Trinity Western will be the tough test for the Dinos men as they take on reigning CIS player of the year Jacob Doerksen and his highly-touted supporting cast.
The next home conference action for the Dinos is Jan. 15-16 when archrival Alberta pays a visit to the Jack.
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