ROCHESTER, Mich. – Beginning their final homestand of the 2022-23 season, the Oakland Golden Grizzlies will welcome the IUPUI Jaguars to the O'rena on Saturday, February 18 at 2 p.m.

Looking to snap out of a funk that has seen them drop six of their last seven, the Golden Grizzlies enter Saturday at 11-14 and 6-10 in the Horizon League.

Having dropped consecutive tilts to the Cleveland State Vikings and Detroit Mercy Titans, IUPUI is 14-12 and 10-7 in conference play.

In the first meeting between these two this season at Indiana Farmers Coliseum on January 22, the Jaguars topped Oakland, 85-69, behind a career-high 30 points from senior Rachel Kent. Freshman point guard Brooke Quarles-Daniels matched a career-best with 20 for the Golden Grizzlies and senior Breanne Beatty had 15.

GOLDEN GRIZZLIES RUNDOWN
Quarles-Daniels is Oakland's leading scorer at 11.4 points-per-game, but the five-time Nike #HLWBB Freshman of the Week is looking to rediscover her groove a bit. After scoring in double figures in 13-straight games from January 5-February 5, she has been held to a total of nine over the last two contests.

Beatty and junior forward Alexis Johnson are also averaging double-digits for the Golden Grizzlies, contributing 10.4 and 10.7, respectively.

Sophomore Kennedie Montue moved back into the starting lineup in the February 11 date with the Robert Morris Colonials and the Steel City native has tallied at least eight points in four of the last five games and buried at least one 3-pointer in six consecutive contests.

Fellow sophomore Aaliyah McQueen, the pride of Flint and a Carman-Ainsworth graduate, and junior Linda van Schaik have become top options off the bench for head coach Jeff Tungate and his assistants.

As a team, Oakland's 64.1 points-per-game are seventh-best in the Horizon League and they are eighth defensively, giving up 70.1.

SCOUTING IUPUI
In their first season under head coach Kate Bruce, the Jaguars were picked sixth in the Preseason Horizon League Coaches Poll, but have exceeded that projection so far as their 10-7 mark is good for fourth in the conference.

A sign of a balanced offensive attack, three IUPUI players rank in the top-8 in the Horizon League in scoring as senior guard and Akron Zips transfer Destiny Perkins is fourth at 13.9 points, classmate and former Ball State Cardinal Jazmyn Turner is fifth at 13.8 and Kent is eighth at 12.8.

With the efforts of these three, plus fellow senior Natalie Andersen's 9.1 points-per-game, the Jaguars are second in the conference at 70.1 points-per-night.

On the defensive end, IUPUI is ninth in the league, allowing 71.1 points-per-contest, exactly one more than the Golden Grizzlies.

TELEVISION AND LIVE STATS LINKS
Saturday's action will air live on ESPN3, which does NOT require a subscription, and can be accessed here.

Additionally, the Live Stats are available at this link.

ALL-TIME SERIES
Dating over 23 years to January 27, 2000, Oakland and the Jaguars have squared off 43 times with IUPUI holding a narrow 23-20 edge.

After the Golden Grizzlies took 20 of the first 30 clashes, the Jaguars have won 13-straight since February 28, 2013.

SEASON-LONG STORYLINES

NEW FACES FOR GOLDEN GRIZZLIES
Faced with the graduations of Kahlaijah Dean, Kayla Luchenbach and Brianna Breedy, who combined to average 28.7 points and 9.9 rebounds last season, the Golden Grizzlies brought in a trio of diversely talented transfers in Raquel Ferrer-Bernad, Alexis Johnson and Linda van Schaik.

A Southfield A&T Warriors graduate, Johnson is a junior forward who played three seasons in Conference USA (C-USA) for the Marshall Thundering Herd, while Ferrer-Bernad is a graduate student point guard who came from a different C-USA program, the Florida International Panthers.

van Schaik, another junior, joined Oakland by way of the Sun Belt Conference's Louisiana-Monroe Warhawks and projects to provide the team with another 3-point shooting threat.

On top of the program's work in the transfer portal, the Golden Grizzlies' 2022 recruiting class features a couple of high-upside players in guard Brooke Quarles-Daniels, a Miss Michigan Basketball candidate a year ago from L'Anse Creuse North, and Lianna Baxter, a 6-foot-1 forward who starred at Oconto and is one of the top-100 scorers in Wisconsin high school history.

BREANNE BEATTY HEADLINES GROUP OF RETURNING PLAYERS
Appearing in all 83 of the program's games over the last three seasons, and starting all but two of them, senior guard/forward Breanne Beatty was named to the Preseason All-Horizon League Second Team on October 18.

The pride of Worthington, Ohio, Beatty is Oakland's leading returning scorer at 9.7 points-per-game in 2021-22.

In addition to Beatty, guards Kennedie Montue and Aaliyah McQueen and forward Miriam Ibezim, all of whom of sophomores, are back with the program and are in line to contribute significantly right from the season's opening tip.

JEFF TUNGATE ENTERS 10^TH SEASON
Named the eighth head coach in program history on July 16, 2013, the 2022-23 campaign is the 10^th with Jeff Tungate at the helm.

Third on the school's all-time wins list with 126, Tungate and four-year veteran assistant Crystal Davis made some changes to the coaching staff ahead of this season, bringing in Golden Grizzly Hall of Famer and former Mercyhurst Lakers head coach Deanna Richard and Tim Webb, who has extensive coaching experience at both the high school and collegiate levels in Michigan, as assistant coaches.