Women’s College Basketball: Wesleyan Earns No. 15 Seed in Naismith Region
The Iowa Wesleyan women’s basketball team has earned the No. 15 seed in the upcoming NAIA National Tournament.
The Tigers will play in the Naismith Region against second-seeded Morningside, with the two teams doing battle in Sioux City.
Iowa Wesleyan, 18-5 on the year, completed a magical about-face in year one under legendary head coach Steve Williamson.
Coming off a two-win season, Williamson and his crew of just seven managed to win the CAC regular season and conference tournament, clinching their spot in the field of 64.
The Tigers have been led all season by the terrific play of Kyla Moore and Brittany West.
Moore was named the CAC Player of the Year, while West was decorated with Newcomer of the Year honors.
Both are averaging 17-plus points per game and will need to be at their best to pull off an upset of the second-seeded Mustangs.
This is the Tigers first NAIA Tournament berth since 2011 and their sixth all-time in school history.
Prep Girls’ Basketball: Three State Finals Set
Three state finals are set for this weekend at Wells Fargo Arena as Classes 3, 4 and 5A played their semifinals yesterday.
Here’s a full look at the scoreboard:
Class 3A
Estherville Lincoln Central 57, Unity Christian 44
Ballard 56, West Lyon 51
Class 4A
Bishop Heelan 68. Glenwood 51
Cedar Rapids Xavier 55, Dallas Center-Grimes 50 F/3OT
Class 5A
Johnston 64, Pleasant Valley 44
Waterloo West 58, West Des Moines Valley 48
Men’s College Basketball: Jacobson Earns MVC Coach of the Year
UNI head men’s basketball coach Ben Jacobson has been named the Missouri Valley Conference’s (MVC) Coach of the Year, as announced by the league office on Thursday.
In his 16th season at the helm of the UNI program, Jacobson becomes the first coach in MVC history to earn Coach of the Year honors five times (2009, 2010, 2015, 2020), breaking a tie with Maury John of Drake.
Under Jacobson, the Panthers claimed the program’s fourth regular season championship and third outright in school history this season.
All four regular season titles in UNI history have come under Jacobson’s leadership.
UNI enters the 2022 MVC Tournament as the top-seeded team in the field, seeking a fifth conference tournament championship in the Jacobson era (2009, 2010, 2015, 2016).
The MVC Tournament begins today in St. Louis.
Prep Sports: Iowa Law Now Bans Trans Athletes from Girls’, Women’s Sports
A bill banning transgender athletes from girls’ and women’s sports in Iowa schools, colleges and universities is now law.
The bill passed the Senate yesterday. Governor Kim Reynolds signed it into law Thursday, surrounded by a large crowd of girls, parents and lawmakers.
Reynolds began publicly advocating for this policy last April. Now that the law is in effect, athletes who identify as girls or women, but were identified on their birth certificate as male may be kicked off teams as soon as today.
Iowa is now the 10th state to have adopted similar laws and lawsuits have been filed in four of them to try to block the policies.