TicketsCINCINNATI – University of Cincinnati women's basketball is set to host the second-ranked UConn Huskies on Saturday, Feb. 2, at noon at Fifth Third Arena.
// TICKETS
General admission tickets to the game are only $5, while tickets inside the Champions Club are just $7. Discounts for youth (ages 4-12) and seniors (ages 65+) include $3 general admission tickets and $5 Champions Club tickets. Tickets can be purchased by either calling 1-877-CATS-TIX, logging onto GoBEARCATS.com/Tickets, or by visiting the Fifth Third Arena ticket office on gameday.
// PARKING
Cash parking will be available at Corry Garage on campus for $5.
// GOING LIVE
The game will be broadcast live on SportsNet New York (SNY) and ESPN3. A live audio stream will be available on Bearcats TV, while live stats can be accessed here.
// GAME PROMOTIONS
In celebration of National Bubble Gum Day, there will be a bubble gum giveaway at the game. The usual concession fare will be available, as well as Skyline and Frisch's. In addition, the regular postgame autograph session will also take place.
// THE SERIES
The Bearcats have come up short in all 20 games against the Huskies. In a meeting last month, junior guard Antoinette Miller (Detroit, Mich./Southfield-Lathrup) led the way for UC with 16 points, four rebounds, three assists, and two steals in a loss. In the last matchup between the two teams in Cincinnati – on Jan. 7, 2017 -- guard Sam Rodgers (Cincinnati, Ohio/Lakota East) scored nine points in the defeat.
// LAST TIME OUT
UC (14-7, 6-2 AAC) gutted out a 57-56 conference road win Wednesday against the USF Bulls at the Yuengling Center. The Bearcats trailed the Bulls, 56-55, with 1:34 left to play, but a Miller jumper with 1:11 to go gave UC a late, 57-56 lead. The Red & Black stayed solid on the defensive end down the stretch to come away with the win. The triumph is the first versus USF since 2011. The trio of Miller, senior guard Nikira Goings (Marietta, Ga./Osborne), and sophomore forward IImar'I Thomas (Oakland, Calif./Sacred Heart Cathedral Prep) combined to score 49 of UC's 57 points. Thomas led the way with 19 points and seven rebounds, while Goings came off the bench to score 18, including three 3-pointers. Miller chipped in 12 points, five rebounds, and four assists, as well as some huge baskets and steals in crunch time.
// SCOUTING THE BEARCATS
Miller is being leaned on to step up this year after the graduation of point guard Ana Owens who scored 1,469 points and dished out 404 assists in her UC career. She has responded by impacting the game in a variety of ways with 11.7 points, 5.5 assists, 4.9 rebounds, and 2.1 steals per game so far in 2018-19. Her assists per game mark (5.5) ranks second in the AAC and 24th in the country, while her steals total (44) ranks fourth in the league. Additionally, her assist-to-turnover ratio (2.2) is 47th-best in NCAA Division I. Miller earned her first-career AAC Weekly Honor Roll distinction Monday after averaging 16.0 points, 8.0 assists, and 5.5 rebounds as the Bearcats tallied two victories last week.
Thomas has been a fixture on The American's weekly honor list with recognition four times this season. On Jan. 21, the sophomore was named Player of the Week for the second time in 2018-19 after averaging 20.0 points, 10.0 rebounds, 2.5 blocks, 2.0 assists, and 1.5 steals as the Bearcats picked up a pair of wins. On Dec. 24, the sophomore landed on the Honor Roll after totaling 23 points, 17 rebounds, six assists and three steals against Howard on Dec. 21. The week prior, she was named AAC Player of the Week and earned a spot on the NCAA's prestigious Weekly Starting Five following scoring 20 points and grabbing a career-high 18 rebounds in the annual Crosstown Shootout vs. Xavier on Dec. 16. Previously, the forward was picked for the Honor Roll on Dec. 10 after averaging 16.0 points and 6.5 rebounds in a pair of contests for the week ending Dec. 9. On the year, she is sixth in the country in field-goal percentage at 66.5 percent from the field.
Rodgers picked up her first AAC Weekly Honor Roll distinction on Jan.7 after recording a career performance on Jan. 6 in UC's AAC-opening, 69-57 home victory over SMU. The Cincinnati native scored a career-best 20 points – 17 of which came in the first half – including a career-high five 3-pointers. The guard was a catalyst in a game-changing, late-second-quarter, 15-0 Bearcats run with three triples. In addition, she tallied another career mark with two blocks. She is 28-of-35 from the free-throw line this season. Her seven misses this year are her only career misses after going 4-for-4 as a freshman and 24-of-24 as a sophomore.
Goings has shown a steady progression throughout her Bearcats career and is stepping up in her senior season. After averaging 2.7 points per game as a freshman, 6.1 as a sophomore, and a team-best 11.2 as a junior, the guard is averaging 8.9 points each contest in 2018-19. After suffering a sprained ankle at UConn on Jan. 9, the senior scored 11 points at UCF the following game with three made 3-pointers. Goings' streak of 18-straight games with a made 3-pointer was snapped against SMU on Jan. 6.
Sophomore post Andeija Puckett (Griffin, Ga./Griffin) has emerged as a legitimate post presence off the bench for the Bearcats. She was a force against Temple on Jan. 16 with a career-best 15 points to go along with eight rebounds and two blocks. Against Memphis, she again came off the pine strong to add 12 points and four rebounds. In conference play, the Georgia native is averaging 5.4 points, 3.5 rebounds, and 1.9 blocks in just 12 minutes per game.
Junior guard Florence Sifa (Bujumbura, Burundi/Jacksonville College) had a long, winding journey to NCAA Division I basketball, but is thriving at UC. Having experienced civil war and political unrest in her east African home country of Burundi, Sifa followed her basketball dream to junior college in Jacksonville, Texas and now to Cincinnati. An athletic guard, she has already proven to be a great, late addition to the Bearcats roster with 7.1 points and 2.6 rebounds per game through 19 contests.
The Bearcats have created a formidable home-court advantage inside newly-renovated Fifth Third Arena this season with an 11-1 record in 2018-19. A 76-72 setback to Old Dominion on Nov. 12 snapped a five-game winning streak at home dating back to last season. UC has responded by reeling off nine-consecutive victories. In total, the Red & Black boasts a 73-percent (35-13) winning percentage on their home court over the last three years.
UC signed a talented, six-member recruiting class for the 2019-20 season on Nov. 11. Stretching from the Mid-Atlantic to the Southeast and all the way to Africa, head coach Michelle Clark-Heard's inaugural Bearcats signing class features players who are tenacious, versatile, and true winners. Signees include: 6-foot-2 forward Jana Abdullah (Alexandria, Egypt/King Integrated American School), 5-foot-6 point guard Aleah Nelson (Nottingham, Md./McDonogh High School), 6-foot-1 wing Jada Scott (Townsend, Ga./Frederica Academy), 6-foot-1 forward Jadyn Scott (Townsend, Ga./Frederica Academy), 5-foot-8 guard Jordan Tuff (Kernersville, N.C./Connections Academy), and 5-foot-8 guard Chellia Watson (Winder, Ga./Window-Barrow High School). Nelson and Tuff were both recently nominated for selection for the 2019 McDonald's All American Game. The Scott twins' brother, Trevon, is a redshirt junior forward on the UC men's basketball team.
UC returns three starters in 2018-19 from a team that won 19 games last year -- its best season in 15 years – and advanced to the semifinals of the American Athletic Conference Championship. With 68 percent of their scoring and 66 percent of their rebounding back, the Bearcats also boast the league's reigning Freshman of the Year in Thomas. UC's leading returning scorer from a year ago, Goings, is also back after averaging 11.2 points per game in 2017-18.
Leading UC this year will be head coach Michelle Clark-Heard who was an assistant at UC from 2002-05 and spent the previous six seasons as the head coach at Western Kentucky. In six seasons at WKU, Clark-Heard reached four NCAA Tournaments, won four conference tournament championships and two regular season conference titles while posting 154 wins, becoming the second-fastest Lady Topper coach to reach 100 victories with the program. She amassed a 154-48 (.762) record at WKU and a 178-80 (.690) career mark. Clark-Heard has led her teams to six-consecutive 20-win seasons and six-straight appearances in the postseason (four NCAA, two WNIT).
At American Athletic Conference Basketball Media Day on Oct. 15, UC was selected to finish fifth in the 12-team league. Chosen by the league's head coaches, the pick is the highest the Bearcats have ever been selected in their six years in the AAC. Five-time The American champion and 2018 NCAA Final Four participant UConn was, again, picked to win the conference title. USF earned one first-place vote and was chosen second. Houston followed in third ahead of UCF, Cincinnati, Temple, SMU, ECU, Tulane, Wichita State, Memphis, and Tulsa to round out the poll.
The Bearcats' home schedule features 16 regular-season home games, highlighted by the annual Skyline Chili Crosstown Shootout against Xavier on Sunday, Dec. 16 and a matchup with perennial national power UConn on Saturday, Feb. 2. View the complete 2018-19 schedule here.
// SCOUTING THE HUSKIES
UConn (18-2, 7-0 AAC) fell, 78-69, Thursday night at No. 3 Louisville. Three Huskies scored in double figures with forward Napheesa Collier leading the way with 20 points. Guards Crystal Dangerfield and Katie Lou Samuelson chipped in 19 and 16 points, respectively. On the season, five UConn players average double-figure scoring, led by Collier's 18.7 points, as well as a team-best 9.9 rebounds per. Samuelson also averages 18.7 points each outing. The duo is tops in the AAC in scoring, with Dangerfield also in first with 5.6 assists per. The Huskies are the best in the conference in 10 statistical categories, most notably scoring offense (81.3 ppg), scoring defense (54.7 ppg), field-goal percentage (.484), field-goal percentage defense (.338), assists (19.0 apg), and 3-point field goals made (8.0 3pg). In the preseason, UConn was picked to win The American for the sixth-straight year, with Samuelson tabbed Player of the Year. Collier and Dangerfield were also both First Team selections.
// FIFTH THIRD ARENA REOPENS
After a 20-month, privately funded, $87-million renovation, Fifth Third Arena reopens in 2018-19. With the arena under renovation, the Bearcats played the 2017-18 season off campus at both Saint Ursula Academy (16 games) and Cincinnati State (two games). UC posted a 12-6 home mark last year.
// TICKETS
General admission tickets to the game are only $5, while tickets inside the Champions Club are just $7. Discounts for youth (ages 4-12) and seniors (ages 65+) include $3 general admission tickets and $5 Champions Club tickets. Tickets can be purchased by either calling 1-877-CATS-TIX, logging onto GoBEARCATS.com/Tickets, or by visiting the Fifth Third Arena ticket office on gameday.
// PARKING
Cash parking will be available at Corry Garage on campus for $5.
// GOING LIVE
The game will be broadcast live on SportsNet New York (SNY) and ESPN3. A live audio stream will be available on Bearcats TV, while live stats can be accessed here.
// GAME PROMOTIONS
In celebration of National Bubble Gum Day, there will be a bubble gum giveaway at the game. The usual concession fare will be available, as well as Skyline and Frisch's. In addition, the regular postgame autograph session will also take place.
// THE SERIES
The Bearcats have come up short in all 20 games against the Huskies. In a meeting last month, junior guard Antoinette Miller (Detroit, Mich./Southfield-Lathrup) led the way for UC with 16 points, four rebounds, three assists, and two steals in a loss. In the last matchup between the two teams in Cincinnati – on Jan. 7, 2017 -- guard Sam Rodgers (Cincinnati, Ohio/Lakota East) scored nine points in the defeat.
// LAST TIME OUT
UC (14-7, 6-2 AAC) gutted out a 57-56 conference road win Wednesday against the USF Bulls at the Yuengling Center. The Bearcats trailed the Bulls, 56-55, with 1:34 left to play, but a Miller jumper with 1:11 to go gave UC a late, 57-56 lead. The Red & Black stayed solid on the defensive end down the stretch to come away with the win. The triumph is the first versus USF since 2011. The trio of Miller, senior guard Nikira Goings (Marietta, Ga./Osborne), and sophomore forward IImar'I Thomas (Oakland, Calif./Sacred Heart Cathedral Prep) combined to score 49 of UC's 57 points. Thomas led the way with 19 points and seven rebounds, while Goings came off the bench to score 18, including three 3-pointers. Miller chipped in 12 points, five rebounds, and four assists, as well as some huge baskets and steals in crunch time.
// SCOUTING THE BEARCATS
Miller is being leaned on to step up this year after the graduation of point guard Ana Owens who scored 1,469 points and dished out 404 assists in her UC career. She has responded by impacting the game in a variety of ways with 11.7 points, 5.5 assists, 4.9 rebounds, and 2.1 steals per game so far in 2018-19. Her assists per game mark (5.5) ranks second in the AAC and 24th in the country, while her steals total (44) ranks fourth in the league. Additionally, her assist-to-turnover ratio (2.2) is 47th-best in NCAA Division I. Miller earned her first-career AAC Weekly Honor Roll distinction Monday after averaging 16.0 points, 8.0 assists, and 5.5 rebounds as the Bearcats tallied two victories last week.
Thomas has been a fixture on The American's weekly honor list with recognition four times this season. On Jan. 21, the sophomore was named Player of the Week for the second time in 2018-19 after averaging 20.0 points, 10.0 rebounds, 2.5 blocks, 2.0 assists, and 1.5 steals as the Bearcats picked up a pair of wins. On Dec. 24, the sophomore landed on the Honor Roll after totaling 23 points, 17 rebounds, six assists and three steals against Howard on Dec. 21. The week prior, she was named AAC Player of the Week and earned a spot on the NCAA's prestigious Weekly Starting Five following scoring 20 points and grabbing a career-high 18 rebounds in the annual Crosstown Shootout vs. Xavier on Dec. 16. Previously, the forward was picked for the Honor Roll on Dec. 10 after averaging 16.0 points and 6.5 rebounds in a pair of contests for the week ending Dec. 9. On the year, she is sixth in the country in field-goal percentage at 66.5 percent from the field.
Rodgers picked up her first AAC Weekly Honor Roll distinction on Jan.7 after recording a career performance on Jan. 6 in UC's AAC-opening, 69-57 home victory over SMU. The Cincinnati native scored a career-best 20 points – 17 of which came in the first half – including a career-high five 3-pointers. The guard was a catalyst in a game-changing, late-second-quarter, 15-0 Bearcats run with three triples. In addition, she tallied another career mark with two blocks. She is 28-of-35 from the free-throw line this season. Her seven misses this year are her only career misses after going 4-for-4 as a freshman and 24-of-24 as a sophomore.
Goings has shown a steady progression throughout her Bearcats career and is stepping up in her senior season. After averaging 2.7 points per game as a freshman, 6.1 as a sophomore, and a team-best 11.2 as a junior, the guard is averaging 8.9 points each contest in 2018-19. After suffering a sprained ankle at UConn on Jan. 9, the senior scored 11 points at UCF the following game with three made 3-pointers. Goings' streak of 18-straight games with a made 3-pointer was snapped against SMU on Jan. 6.
Sophomore post Andeija Puckett (Griffin, Ga./Griffin) has emerged as a legitimate post presence off the bench for the Bearcats. She was a force against Temple on Jan. 16 with a career-best 15 points to go along with eight rebounds and two blocks. Against Memphis, she again came off the pine strong to add 12 points and four rebounds. In conference play, the Georgia native is averaging 5.4 points, 3.5 rebounds, and 1.9 blocks in just 12 minutes per game.
Junior guard Florence Sifa (Bujumbura, Burundi/Jacksonville College) had a long, winding journey to NCAA Division I basketball, but is thriving at UC. Having experienced civil war and political unrest in her east African home country of Burundi, Sifa followed her basketball dream to junior college in Jacksonville, Texas and now to Cincinnati. An athletic guard, she has already proven to be a great, late addition to the Bearcats roster with 7.1 points and 2.6 rebounds per game through 19 contests.
The Bearcats have created a formidable home-court advantage inside newly-renovated Fifth Third Arena this season with an 11-1 record in 2018-19. A 76-72 setback to Old Dominion on Nov. 12 snapped a five-game winning streak at home dating back to last season. UC has responded by reeling off nine-consecutive victories. In total, the Red & Black boasts a 73-percent (35-13) winning percentage on their home court over the last three years.
UC signed a talented, six-member recruiting class for the 2019-20 season on Nov. 11. Stretching from the Mid-Atlantic to the Southeast and all the way to Africa, head coach Michelle Clark-Heard's inaugural Bearcats signing class features players who are tenacious, versatile, and true winners. Signees include: 6-foot-2 forward Jana Abdullah (Alexandria, Egypt/King Integrated American School), 5-foot-6 point guard Aleah Nelson (Nottingham, Md./McDonogh High School), 6-foot-1 wing Jada Scott (Townsend, Ga./Frederica Academy), 6-foot-1 forward Jadyn Scott (Townsend, Ga./Frederica Academy), 5-foot-8 guard Jordan Tuff (Kernersville, N.C./Connections Academy), and 5-foot-8 guard Chellia Watson (Winder, Ga./Window-Barrow High School). Nelson and Tuff were both recently nominated for selection for the 2019 McDonald's All American Game. The Scott twins' brother, Trevon, is a redshirt junior forward on the UC men's basketball team.
UC returns three starters in 2018-19 from a team that won 19 games last year -- its best season in 15 years – and advanced to the semifinals of the American Athletic Conference Championship. With 68 percent of their scoring and 66 percent of their rebounding back, the Bearcats also boast the league's reigning Freshman of the Year in Thomas. UC's leading returning scorer from a year ago, Goings, is also back after averaging 11.2 points per game in 2017-18.
Leading UC this year will be head coach Michelle Clark-Heard who was an assistant at UC from 2002-05 and spent the previous six seasons as the head coach at Western Kentucky. In six seasons at WKU, Clark-Heard reached four NCAA Tournaments, won four conference tournament championships and two regular season conference titles while posting 154 wins, becoming the second-fastest Lady Topper coach to reach 100 victories with the program. She amassed a 154-48 (.762) record at WKU and a 178-80 (.690) career mark. Clark-Heard has led her teams to six-consecutive 20-win seasons and six-straight appearances in the postseason (four NCAA, two WNIT).
At American Athletic Conference Basketball Media Day on Oct. 15, UC was selected to finish fifth in the 12-team league. Chosen by the league's head coaches, the pick is the highest the Bearcats have ever been selected in their six years in the AAC. Five-time The American champion and 2018 NCAA Final Four participant UConn was, again, picked to win the conference title. USF earned one first-place vote and was chosen second. Houston followed in third ahead of UCF, Cincinnati, Temple, SMU, ECU, Tulane, Wichita State, Memphis, and Tulsa to round out the poll.
The Bearcats' home schedule features 16 regular-season home games, highlighted by the annual Skyline Chili Crosstown Shootout against Xavier on Sunday, Dec. 16 and a matchup with perennial national power UConn on Saturday, Feb. 2. View the complete 2018-19 schedule here.
// SCOUTING THE HUSKIES
UConn (18-2, 7-0 AAC) fell, 78-69, Thursday night at No. 3 Louisville. Three Huskies scored in double figures with forward Napheesa Collier leading the way with 20 points. Guards Crystal Dangerfield and Katie Lou Samuelson chipped in 19 and 16 points, respectively. On the season, five UConn players average double-figure scoring, led by Collier's 18.7 points, as well as a team-best 9.9 rebounds per. Samuelson also averages 18.7 points each outing. The duo is tops in the AAC in scoring, with Dangerfield also in first with 5.6 assists per. The Huskies are the best in the conference in 10 statistical categories, most notably scoring offense (81.3 ppg), scoring defense (54.7 ppg), field-goal percentage (.484), field-goal percentage defense (.338), assists (19.0 apg), and 3-point field goals made (8.0 3pg). In the preseason, UConn was picked to win The American for the sixth-straight year, with Samuelson tabbed Player of the Year. Collier and Dangerfield were also both First Team selections.
// FIFTH THIRD ARENA REOPENS
After a 20-month, privately funded, $87-million renovation, Fifth Third Arena reopens in 2018-19. With the arena under renovation, the Bearcats played the 2017-18 season off campus at both Saint Ursula Academy (16 games) and Cincinnati State (two games). UC posted a 12-6 home mark last year.