MOSCOW, Idaho - The Vandal women's team hosts St. Thomas in the Big Sky Summit Challenge. It is the first meeting for the two teams who are off to a great start. Idaho has won five straight and has cracked the top-100 in NCAA Net Rankings. The Tommies are 6-3 with two DI road wins. The coaching match up is between first-year Vandal coach Marthur Moreira and 20-year veteran Ruth Sinn.
ABOUT IDAHO
Idaho has won five straight by double-digits, including three road wins over D1 opponents. The Vandals toppeled Cal Poly 74-54, shooting a season-best 52.6% (30-57) from the field and outrebounding the Mustangs 40-28. Idaho is 1-0 against NAIA opponents this year.
Rosie Schweizer leads Idaho with 12.6 PPG and
Jennifer Aadland averages 10.4 points and 10.1 rebounds per game.
ABOUT ST. THOMAS
Four Tommies average double digits so far this season. Jo Langbehn leads the way with 17.6 points per game and has scored in double-digits in every game but one. The Tommies are averaging 72.5 PPG . Veteran coach Ruth Sinn is in her 20th season and has nine-time conference tournament championships to her name.
GRADUATE TRANSFERS
Three Vandals;
Olivia Nelson,
Rosie Schweizer and
Jennifer Aadland bring extensive experience into the fray for Idaho.Nelson has started in every game during her four year career at Central Missouri (117).
Jennifer Aadland has 98 starts in 99 career games for Augustana (S.D.) The two met early last season with Central Missouri coming out on top. Aadland scored 16 points while Nelson scored a career-high 29.
Schweizer had 93 games under her belt, including six starts for West Coast Conference team Pacific.
ALL-FRESHMAN TEAM TRANSFERS
Kelbie Washington and
Hope Hassmann both earned All-Freshman Team honors for their respective teams. Hassmann played and started all 31 games for Fullerton last season, scoring 302 points and dishing out 87 assists.
Washington was a All-Big 12 honoree at Oklahoma and earned National Freshman of the Week honors. She missed the last two seasons with an illness.
INTERNATIONAL IMPACT
Five players on this year's roster are international, including two from Brazil, home of head coach
Arthur Moreira and one from Portugal, who shares the Portuguese language with Brazil.
Vitória Carvalho and Ana Beatriz Passos hail from Brazil.
Ana Pinheiro is from Portugal.
Anja Bukvic from Belgrade Serbia and
Rosie Schweizer is from Australia.
ICCU ARENA
The Vandals enter the fourth season of play at the amazing ICCU Arena in Moscow. The $51 million arena sits just over 4,200 fans and includes the latest technology for fan and student-athlete experience. The Vandals are 21-19 all-time in the Arena.
COACHING STAFF
First-Year Head Coach
Arthur Moreira compiled a coaching staff of former co-workers, opponents and trusted recruiters.
His first move was to retain and promote
Drew Muscatell. Muscatell was promoted to Associate Head Coach during the offseason. He enters his seventh season as an assistant for the Vandals and has worked for three different head coaches.
Moreira added former Montana Assistant Coach
Lindsey Foster to his staff. Foster was a coach at Montana for one season, before that, she was the head coach at DII Academy of Art in San Francisco.
Derek Saich served as the Director of Operations and Assistant Coach at Moreira's former school San Francisco. The two worked together for two seasons at USF.
The final assistant is
Denise Rosario, an experienced junior college coach from South Plains Junior College in Texas. She has extensive international recruiting connections, hailing from Minas Gerais, Brazil.
NET HISTORY
The Idaho women's team reached the highest net ranking in program history this week, cracking the top 100 for the first time ever. During the 2020-21 season, women's basketball introduced daily NET rankings for Division I. In that season, the Vandals reached their highest ranking of 126 on 3/11/21. They finished with an overall ranking of 133, improving 86 spots compared to their starting position of 219.
In 2021-22 and 2022-23, Idaho struggled in the rankings unable to surpass the 200 mark. The highest ranking in 2021-22 was 202 (2/5/22) and the highest in 2022-23 was 205 (3/5/23).
In 2023-24, Idaho had its highest start at 167 and kept climbing. On 1/10/24, the Vandals ranked at 125, breaking the previous program record.
REBOUND LEADERS
After playing a pair of tough, long power-five level teams, you would think that Idaho would have been dominated on the boards, but the Vandals have outrebounded every opponent so far this season, including a 52-36 advantage over Washington State. The Vandals stand atop the Big Sky for team rebounds.
Jennifer Aadland has led the way, averaging 10.1 rebounds per game, including 18 rebounds against Washington State.
PRESEASON BIG SKY POLLS
The Vandals were picked eighth in the Big Sky Coaches Poll and seventh in the Big Sky Media Poll. No Idaho players were named to the Big Sky Preseason All-Conference Team. Northern Arizona was picked to win the league in both polls.
Idaho was picked in the same spot a season ago and finished sixth in the league.
BIG SKY-SUMMIT CHALLENGE
Idaho and St. Thomas are playing as part of the Big Sky-Summit Challenge. It is the first meeting of the two teams. The Tommies are in their fourth season as a Division I school after a transition directly from DIII. The Tommies are off to a 5-3 start, the best in the DI era.
NEWCOMER IMPACT
All five starters so far this season are newcomers to the team. Of Idaho's 394 points this season, 375 have come from players who were not on the roster a year ago.
Rosie Schweizer has a pair of 20+ point road games
REBOUNDING LEADER
Jennifer Aadland is 13th in the nation in defensive rebounds and is 24th in rebounds per game. She had a career-high 18 rebounds against WSU and has been in double figures in four of six games.
