Utah Utes women's basketball: Receives a WNIT bid, will face St. Mary's

SALT LAKE CITY — Late Monday night, the University of Utah women's basketball team received an invitation to play in the Women's National Invitational Tournament in a matchup with St. Mary's College on Sunday.

Game time will be announced later, but the Utes will travel to California because of a facility conflict.

"It's excellent that we don't play until Sunday after a long conference tournament," said coach Elaine Elliott, "and we are glad our kids won't miss another week of school."

St. Mary's is 21-9 overall and finished second in the West Coast Conference with a 12-2 record. The Gaels were upset in the conference tournament semifinals by Pepperdine, 62-56. Louella Tomlinson leads the team with 17 points and 11.1 rebounds per game. An All-WCC first-team selection, she was also named as the WCC Defender of the Year. Jontell Smith was also named to the first team. She is averaging 13.3 points per game.

"We don't know anything about them yet, but we will start watching film tomorrow," Elliott said.

After a heart-stopping run through the MWC Tournament in Las Vegas last week, where the Utes played in two overtime contests, they just missed the automatic qualifier entry for the NCAA tournament, losing in overtime to San Diego State.

With conference scoring leader Kalee Whipple averaging 16.7 points a game and center Taryn Wicijowski playing outstanding recently, Elliott is hoping the Utes' inside and outside offensive game will come together for the WNIT.

Four MWC teams were invited to the WNIT. Besides the Utes, New Mexico, BYU and Wyoming also received invitations. Utah is 3-6 all time in four WNIT appearances. The Utes last played in the tournament in 2007, when they advanced to the second round.

WNIT first round

Utah at St. Mary's College

Sunday, time TBA

Moraga, Calif.

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