BYU women's basketball: Ready to play Wyoming in WNIT

LARAMIE, Wyo. — The state of Utah does still have one team remaining in the college basketball postseason. The BYU women's team has slid right through to the Women's National Invitation Tournament third round and will face a familiar foe tonight in taking a stab at making the Elite Eight.

After two rounds of facing opponents the Cougars hadn't met in decades, BYU is now travelling a familiar road to Laramie to take on MWC rivals, the Wyoming Cowgirls.

The two teams split in the conference regular season with each squad winning on its home court. The Cowboys took it to the Cougars in Laramie 69-54 as they took strong advantage of a difficult home court for opposing teams to play in. BYU came back to win 51-48 at the Marriott Center but will have to figure out a way to neutralize the Wyoming advantage at home if they want to advance to the quarterfinals of the WNIT.

The game will be played at 7 p.m. at the Arena Auditorium, a place where the Cowgirls are 13-2 this season.

Aubrey Vandiver and Emma Langford did most of the damage against the Cougars in the two regular season games the teams played, but it was when the Cougars allowed other members of the Wyoming team to score as well that they had all of the trouble in Laramie.

The Cougars love to use their balance as an advantage against teams that don't know them well, but they won't have that chance against the Cowgirls, who know them as well as anyone in the NCAA. They do still have that extreme balance though, and no one ever knows which Cougar will explode on any given night.

BYU is 22-9 going into the game against Wyoming, which will come in with a 21-11 record. BYU finished the MWC race in second place while the Cowgirls tied for fifth.

BYU advanced to the WNIT third round with a 61-53 victory over Arizona State, spurred on by a quick start. The Cowgirls disposed of Texas Tech in overtime 68-57 in their second round game on Tuesday.

WNIT third round

BYU at Wyoming

Today, 7 p.m.

TV: The mtn.

e-mail: jolsen@desnews.com