Oilers Host Hillsdale in First Round of G-MAC Tournament
The Games
The Oilers have made their way into the G-MAC Tournament for the second consecutive season and will take on Hillsdale for the third time this season in the opening round game. The matchup features the two teams who were tied as the preseason favorites to win the conference. They enter the tournament as four and five seeds and will play their quarterfinal game in Croy Gymnasium on Tuesday, March 5 at 5:30 pm.
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Series Information
The Oilers and Chargers' series could not be any closer as each team has won 23 games in the series. Findlay won the first matchup in the series, a 74-47 victory in the 1985-86 season.
This season the two teams split their matchups. On January 19, the Oilers defeated Hillsdale at home by a score of 69-64. In that game, Elissa Ellerbrock led the way for Findlay with 14 points while Allie Thobe scored 12 and grabbed eight rebounds. Thobe also led the squad with five steals.
Two weeks later the Oilers traveled to the home of the Chargers and lost 88-67. Anna Hintz scored 22 while Thobe scored 16, grabbed six rebounds, and had three assists.
This is the second consecutive year that Hillsdale and Findlay will match up in the tournament. Last season they met in the conference tournament championship, a game with Chargers would win 81-70. Hillsdale was a five seed last season, just as they area this year, while the Oilers were seeded second. In that title game Findlay's Haley Horstman led all scorers with 23 points while Anna Hintz scored 16 and had seven rebounds.
In that championship game for Hillsdale, Brittany Gray led the way with 22 points while Allie Dewire scored 16 and Makenna Ott scored 12 and grabbed nine rebounds.All three of those players are back for this season's tournament matchup.
Findlay (20-7, 16-6 G-MAC)
Findlay ended their regular season with three consecutive wins to hold their fourth place spot in the standings, earning the right to host the quarterfinal round in Croy.
Senior Anna Hintz has been the driving force for the Oilers all season, leading the league in both points and rebounds for the majority of the year. She is scoring 18.9 points per game and grabs 8.5 rebounds and is arguably the top candidate for the conference's Player of the Year race. She has 12 double-doubles this year. In her career, Hintz has scored 1,479 points and is just 19 points shy of moving into possession of second on Findlay's all-time scoring list. Hintz is also in position to become the first player in school history to average more than 18 points per game in multiples seasons. Only Mianda Watts has had a season with a higher ppg average as she scored 21.4 ppg in 1999-00.
Senior Elissa Ellerbrock is also in double-figures at 11.3 points per game this season. She is grabbing 5.1 rebounds and, in Findlay's home game against Hillsdale earlier this season, shot 6-for-8 with 14 points.
At 8.3 points per game, senior Allie Thobe has seen an uptick in scoring from her junior season, averaging six more points per game than a season ago. She is also grabbing almost three more rebounds per game than last season and with 62 steals this season, has more than twice the amount she had in her junior year (30). Thobe ranks third in the conference at 2.3 steals per game.
Seniors Jenna Stegmaier and Christa Puthoff are scoring 6.7 and 6.1 ppg, respectively to round out the starting lineup.
Hillsdale (15-13, 13-9 G-MAC)
The Chargers ended the year as one of the league's hottest teams as they rattled off eight wins in their final nine games to move into fifth in the standings. Their lone loss in that stretch was in their final game of the regular season on March 2 against the regular season co-champion, Kentucky Wesleyan.
Hillsdale was the fourth-highest scoring team in the league this year at 72.1 ppg, one point better than Findlay, but gave up just over 67 ppg which ranked eighth. They are a team that lives and dies by the three as the Chargers shot a league-leading 807 times from three point range despite making just 31.7% from there.
Another area that Hillsdale relies on is their rebounding. The Blue and White were tops in the league at 43.6 rebounds per game, 14.1 of which came on the offensive glass, also the best in the league.
Allie Dewire is the team's top scorer and comes into the postseason scoring 13.8 ppg. Dewire can get hot, however, as she had five games this season with more than 20 points including a season-high 33 points on Jan 31. against Tiffin.
As a team that relies on the triple,Brittany Gray is the player for Hillsdale that shoulders that load more than any other. She shoots eight threes per game, making three per game. She is scoring 13.7 ppg this year and has made 80 shots from deep. In her career, Gray has canned 190 shots from deep in 533 attempts.
Helpful Links
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