STEVENS POINT, Wis. – The UW-Stevens Point women's basketball team plays its second consecutive ranked opponent and third in six games to start the season when it travels to Kenosha to face No. 23 Carthage on Saturday afternoon.

THE BASICS
Who: UW-Stevens Point (3-2) at No. 23 Carthage (4-1)
When: Saturday, Dec. 5 – 2 p.m.
Where: Kenosha, Wis. – Tarble Arena

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ABOUT UW-STEVENS POINT | HOME | ROSTER | SCHEDULE | STATS

LAST TIME OUT
Kaitlin Langer had 18 points, 15 rebounds and nine blocks for No. 18 St. Thomas as the Tommies outlasted UW-Stevens Point 51-48 on Sunday afternoon. The Tommies led 47-42 with 1:22 remaining before UWSP scored the next four points to get within one with 17 seconds to go. Both teams scored two points on their next possession, leaving the margin at one. Langer then gave UST a three-point lead with a pair of free throws and blocked a shot on the final possession.

Earlier in the week, Erin Crownover (Menomonee Falls, WI/Menomonee Falls) led four players in double figures with 14 points off the bench as the Pointers topped Lakeland 68-59 on Tuesday. UWSP overcame a slow start to score 60 points over the final three quarters. UW-Stevens Point used a 9-3 run early in the fourth quarter to take an eight-point lead and would lead by at least six the rest of the way.

BENCH PRODUCTION
UW-Stevens Point's bench as outscored its opponent's bench in all five games this season. In four of the five games, the Pointers' reserves have outscored their opponents' reserves by at least 10 points.

Through five games, the UWSP bench is averaging 27.2 points per game, compared to 14.6 percent for opposing teams. UW-Stevens Point's bench has scored 136 of the team's 309 points (44.0 percent) this season.

LOCKING DOWN
UW-Stevens Point ranks second in the Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (WIAC) in scoring defense this season, holding its opponents to an average of 55.0 points per game. That number trails only UW-Oshkosh (47.4 ppg). Last year, the Pointers allowed an average of 55.6 points per game.

The Pointers have limited their opponents to under 60 points in four of the five games and the University of Chicago's total of 63 is the most UWSP has allowed in a game this season.

SCORING LEADERS
Five different players have led UW-Stevens Point in scoring in the team's five games this season. Autumn Hennes (Kaukauna, WI/Kaukauna) scored 22 points in the opener, Mickey Roland (New London, WI/New London) had 17 against WashU, Allie Miceli (Marseilles, IL/Ottawa Township) led the way with eight at Chicago, Crownover posted 14 against Lakeland and Sarah Gamillo (Colby, WI/Colby) had a team-high 11 against St. Thomas.

Last season, eight different players led the team or tied for the team lead in scoring in a game.

HITTING THE OFFENSIVE GLASS
UW-Stevens Point has grabbed 88 offensive rebounds through five games and leads the WIAC with an average of 17.6 offensive boards a game. The Pointers have rebounded over half (50.9 percent) of their missed shots this season. Three UWSP players rank inside the WIAC's top 10 in offensive rebounding: Miceli (2nd, 3.4), Hennes (T-6th, 2.4) and Taylor Douglas (Brodhead, WI/Brodhead) (9th, 2.25).

UWSP VS. RANKED TEAMS
UW-Stevens Point is 1-1 against ranked teams this season, defeating No. 9 Washington (Mo.) 61-57 on Nov. 20 and falling to No. 18 St. Thomas 51-48 on Nov. 29. The Pointers are 3-3 in their last six games against top-25 teams since Dec. 13, 2014.

IN THE POLLS
UW-Stevens Point received two votes in this week's D3hoops.com Top 25, the first poll of the regular season. The Pointers had not received votes in the national rankings in 22 polls, going back to the middle of the 2013-14 season.

ABOUT CARTHAGE | HOME | ROSTER | SCHEDULE | STATS
No. 23 Carthage saw its four-game winning streak to start the season come to an end with a 63-61 loss to Clarke on Wednesday evening. The Lady Reds cut a seven-point deficit late in the fourth quarter to two with 18 seconds to go and, after a pair of missed Clarke free throws, had a chance to tie or win but a runner by Bailey Gilbert did not fall. Gilbert and Morgan Harris each had 18 points in the loss.

Prior to the loss, Carthage had won its first four games of the season, all by between six and 10 points. The Lady Reds opened the season with wins over Lakeland and Nebraska Wesleyan at the Lakeland Tip-Off Tournament before topping Loras at home and the University of Chicago on the road. The Lady Reds trailed the Maroons 37-24 at the half but outscored them 40-20 in the second half to prevail 64-57.

Harris leads Carthage and the College Conference of Illinois & Wisconsin (CCIW) in scoring (21.2 ppg) and entered the week just outside the top 10 nationally in scoring (T-11th, 22.0 ppg). Gilbert (13.6 ppg) and Erin Thomas (11.8 ppg) also average in double figures and the trio accounts for 72.2 percent (221 of 306) of Carthage's scoring this season.

The Lady Reds cracked the D3hoops.com Women's Top 25 this week at No.23 after being unranked in the preseason poll. Carthage was picked second in the CCIW preseason poll behind Wheaton (Ill.).

Carthage entered the week as one of the top free-throw shooting teams in the country, ranking 11th nationally by shooting 78.7 percent from the charity stripe. That number rose to 79.8 percent after the Lady Reds were 12-for-14 (85.7 percent) at the line in the loss to Clarke.

THE COACHES
Shirley Egner is in her 27th season as the head coach at UW-Stevens Point and is the all-time winningest coach in Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (WIAC) history with a 490-213 (.697) career record. Over the last 14 seasons, Egner has guided the Pointers to a 319-87 record, the best mark of any WIAC team over that span. She is a four-time WIAC Coach of the Year honoree, a three-time Wisconsin Basketball Coaches Association (WBCA) Division III Women's Coach of the Year (2010-12) was inducted into the WBCA Hall of Fame in 2010. In 2001-02, Egner led the Pointers to the national title and a 30-3 record to become just the eighth team in Division III history to win 30 games in a season.

The 2015-16 season is Tim Bemero's 13th as the Lady Reds' head coach. He is Carthage's all-time winningest women's basketball coach with a career record of 222-109 (.671). His .656 winning percentage in College Conference of Illinois & Wisconsin (CCIW) play ranks fourth in league history among coaches with tenures of 10 years or more. In the last seven seasons, Bemero has led the Lady Reds to an average of more than 21 wins a seasons, including an Elite Eight appearance in 2012 and a Sweet 16 berth in 2014.

SERIES NOTES
All four meetings between UW-Stevens Point and Carthage came between 1968 and 1978, when the two teams were members of the Wisconsin Women's Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (WWIAC). The Pointers lead the series 3-1. The two teams last met on Feb. 4, 1978 in Stevens Point.