Stoermer Steals Victory From Northern Arizona
BOXSCORE: Northern Arizona
GREELEY, Colo. - Forcing 30 turnovers with a season-best 17 steals, the Northern Colorado (10-11, 4-4 Big Sky) women's basketball team held on to win a 59-53 game on Saturday afternoon against Northern Arizona (6-15, 3-5 Big Sky).
Sophomore guard Courtney Stoermer established a new school Division I era record with nine steals, breaking the old record of six held by herself earlier this year at Eastern Washington and Amber Elliott from 2003. She also led the Bears with 21 points.
Sophomore forward Kate Kevorken notched her third career double-double and first of the season on her 21st birthday with 16 points and 10 rebounds, making half of the team's six three-pointers.
The game also saw the return of senior forward Jamie Schroeder. She played 21 minutes, getting three points, two assists, two steals and one rebound. With 29 seconds left in the game and the Bears up three, 56-53, she notched a steal right under NAU's basket to seal the win.
"I thought she played really tough," said head coach Jaime White speaking of Stoermer. "That 23 (Janelle Matthews) is a really good shooter on Northern Arizona and once again Stoermer steps up and holds the kid to only eight points. That helped us get some confidence on the offensive end. I think every single kid on our team played out-of-body tonight. I thought it was a great team effort, everyone came in and gave solid minutes."
Sade Cunningham led the Lumberjacks in scoring with 23 points, but also had 12 turnovers and was the only player in double figures in the scoring column. Katie Schafer led the team with eight rebounds and had two of the team's five steals.
Northern Arizona led the game at half, 27-26 and was out-rebounding the Bears, 21-11. Northern Colorado came out focused in the second stanza, scoring seven more, 33-26 and grabbing 22 rebounds, compared to 19 for the ‘Jacks.
The Bears played just eight in the contest and everyone contributed with all eight scoring at least one points, grabbing one rebound and tallying one steal and six of the eight had at least one assist.
Northern Colorado hits the road next week for contests at Weber State and Idaho State on Thursday and Saturday, respectively. The Bears defeated the Wildcats and lost to the Bengals during the first half of conference play.
