Women's Basketball Hosts No. 17 Vanderbilt Thursday At 7 PM

Thursday's Game
The Quinnipiac University women's basketball hosts No. 17 Vanderbilt Thursday night at 7 p.m., at the TD Bank Sports Center in a nonconference matchup. The Bobcats are coming off a loss to the UMass Minutewomen in the Championship Game of the Brown Bear Classic Sunday afternoon in Providence, R.I. Quinnipiac won the first game of the week against Morgan State, 68-57, to advance to the title game of the annual tournament hosted by Brown University. Free "Game-Day Gold Jerseys" will be available to fans as well.

Scouting The Commodores
Vanderbilt is the first Southeast Conference team to ever make an appearance on the Bobcats' schedule. The Commodores dropped three spots in this week's USA Today/ESPN Division I Top 25 Coaches' Poll to No. 17 after being ranked at 14th last week. The drop was the result of Vanderbilt losing its first game of the season, 66-60 to Bowling Green on Dec. 4. In the team's most recent game, they defeated Western Kentucky, 79-73, in overtime on their home floor Sunday night. Sporting an 8-1 record coming into the game against the Bobcats, the Commodores are led by a trio of players averaging 12+ points per game. Merideth Marsh (12.7 ppg), Hannah Tuomi (12.4.ppg) and Jence Rhoads (12.1 ppg) are the top three scorers on Vanderbilt, while Toumi and Jordan Coleman each lead the team with 6.4 rebounds per game. Vanderbilt won the SEC Tournament Championship in 2009.

Multimedia
Thursday's game can be heard live on the WQAQ web stream. Alex Birsh will handle play-by-play duties with Andrew Gau adding color commentary. Fans can also follow the action using live stats provided by www.quinnipiacbobcats.com. A live video feed of the game is available through the Bobcat Channel. All can be accessed by clicking the appropriate links above.

Weekend Split
After jumping out to an early lead against Morgan State in the first game of the Brown Bear Classic, the Bobcats held on for an 11-point win over the Bears. Against UMass, Quinnipiac fell victim to a late first-half run and lights-out shooting from the floor and free-throw line in the second half, losing to the Minutewomen, 82-66.

Lenn'ding All She Can
Named to the all-tournament team at Brown, redshirt senior Kathleen Neyens (Jaffrey, N.H.) finished the weekend with 30 points as she posted her two best scoring outputs of the season. Her 17 points against Morgan State were one shy of tying her career high of 18.

Back At It
Courtney Kaminski's (Dudley, Mass.) 14 points against UMass gives the redshirt junior double-digit scoring figures in her last three games. In four of six games this season, the Quinnipiac forward has reached the 10-point mark, including a season-high 18 against St. Bonaventure Dec. 2 at the TD Bank Sports Center.

New Highs
Sophomore forward Jacki Mann (Rutherford, N.J.) set a new career high in points with 15 against UMass. The 15-point showing marked the first time that Mann has reached double figures in scoring, eclipsing her previous high of nine points set twice during her freshman season. She also added eight rebounds, two shy a double-double and her career high in boards.

Assisting All Over
Redshirt freshman guard Felicia Barron (Springfield, Mass.) posted back-to-back eight-point games on Brown's court. Barron added 11 assists over the weekend, though, pushing her streak of games with at least five assists to four. She ranks fourth in the Northeast Conference, averaging 4.5 assists per game.

Dunbar Rebounds
After her least productive game of the season against St. Bonaventure, scoring just three points, sophomore Jacinda Dunbar (Edison, N.J.) bounced back against Morgan State. Dunbar finished with 11 points and eight rebounds. This season, Dunbar has just one game in which she has shot below .500 from the field. She leads the team with 42 rebounds and is averaging a team-best 7.0 per game.

That's A Lot of Shots
Kaminski's 22 field-goal attempts Sunday against UMass were the most by a Quinnipiac player since Erin Kerner attempted 27 last February against Saint Francis (Pa.). It marked the only game since that has seen a Bobcats player attempt 20 or more field goals. Kaminski finished second on the team in scoring with 14 points against the Minutewomen.

We Know What She's All About
Junior Alyssa Jann (Westford, Mass.) has made six field goals this season. Five of those field goals have come from three-point range. In each of the last five games, Jann has made one three pointer with St. Bonaventure being the only game in which she has connected on a shot from inside the arc.