GAME INFORMATION
GAME #24: Cornell at Yale
GAME TIME: Friday, Feb. 23, at 6:00 p.m.
GAME SITE: Payne Whitney Gym (New Haven, Conn.)
SERIES RECORD: Yale leads, 51-27
LAST MEETING: Yale, 6865-55 (2/10/2018 in Ithaca, N.Y.)
2017 RECORDS: Cornell (6-17, 2-8 Ivy); Yale (13-10, 6-4 Ivy)
LIVE STATS: http://www.yalebulldogs.com/sports/w-baskbl/2017-18/boxscores/20180223_0dhx.xml  
LIVE VIDEO: www.IvyLeague.tv
 
* GAME NOTES (PDF)
 
THE MATCHUP: The Big Red hit the road for the final time this season when it travels to Yale and Brown this weekend. Cornell will look to avenge its loss to the Bulldogs from earlier this season when the teams tip off in Payne Whitney Gymnasium on Friday, Feb. 23 at 6 p.m.
 
QUICK HITS:
• Samantha Widmann enters the contest needing just two steals to move into Cornell's top 10 for season steals … She currently ranks 84th in the nation for steals per game (2.35).
• Yale defeated the Big Red in the first game of the series this season.
• Cornell and Yale have three common non-conference opponent – Colgate, Binghamton, and Stony Brook. Yale defeated all three, while the Big Red fell to both the Raiders and Bearcats, but beat the Seawolves. 
• The Big Red ended a seven-game skid in New Haven with a victory over Yale in Payne Whitney Gym a year ago.
• Cornell hasn't won back-to-back games in New Haven since 2007-08/2008-09.
 
SERIES VS. YALE: Cornell's rivalry with Yale began in 1974-75 with Yale taking the 31-23 victory.
•Since 2000, the Big Red holds the slim one-game lead in the series (17-16), after dropping the first meeting this season to the Bulldogs in Ithaca.
• The Big Red won both meetings vs. Yale last season, earning its first season-sweep of the Bulldogs since winning  both games during the 2008-09 campaign.
• Cornell's victory last season in New Haven was the first for the Big Red since 2008-09.
  
HEAD COACH DAYNA SMITH: In her 16th season, Dayna Smith ranks fourth overall in Ivy League women's basketball history in years served as a head coach in the conference.
• Only one active coach, Harvard's Kathy Delaney-Smith (35th season), ranks ahead of Cornell's Smith.
• She is the winningest coach in Cornell history, ranking fifth in Ivy League women's basketball all-time, with 175 victories.
 
NOTING THE PENN GAME: Since the 2010-11 season, the Cornell/Penn women's basketball game has been defined by defense and Saturday's contest was no exception as the Quakers earned a hard-fought 53-39 victory at Newman Arena.
• The contest marks the 10th time in the last 15 meetings that one team was held below 50 points, and sixth time in that span that both teams combined for fewer than 100 points.
• Samantha Widmann lead the Big Red with 10 points, eight rebounds and four assists.
• Danielle Jorgenson chipped in eight points and registered a career-high six steals, a mark good for 15th in Cornell history.  
• Penn (17-6, 8-2 Ivy) was led by Michell Nwokedi's 20-point, 13-rebound double-double. 
• The Quakers shot 38.8 percent from the floor (19-49) and just 20 percent from beyond the arc (3-15), but held Cornell to 32 percent overall (16-50) and a mere 13.3 percent from 3-point range (2-15). 
• Penn also held the 37-30 edge in rebounds and had two fewer turnovers than the Big Red (16-14).  

SEASON NOTES TO KNOW:
• Cornell is 4-3 in games in which Samantha Widman has scored 20 points.
• The Big Red's defense has held four opponents – Stony Brook, UNH, NJIT, and Columbia – to fewer than 50 points.
• Samantha Widmann has led Cornell in scoring in 16 of its 23 contests so far this season.
• Samantha Widmann has registered double-digits in 17 of 23 games for the Big Red, including seven 20+ point performances and a career-high 28 points vs. Oakland.
• Samantha Widmann has registered at least three steals in 11 games this season.
• Christine Ehland has grabbed at least five rebounds in all but seven games this season.   
• In the 18 games since becoming a starter, Samantha Clement has posted double-digits eight times, with one 20-point performance.
• Danielle Jorgenson has handed out at least five assists in eight games.
• Elodie Furey has led the team in rebounding in five games this season.
• 12 of Cornell's 13 active players have already set a career-high in points this season. 
• Two Big Red – Dylan Higgins and Stephanie Umeh – saw more minutes in the season-opener than they did all of last season.
• Danielle Jorgenson surpassed her career minutes in the third game of the season.
• The Big Red played seven-straight road games between Dec. 21 and Jan. 20. It was the longest road trip since the Big Red played seven consecutive games away from Newman Arena from Jan. 12 to Feb. 5 during the 2004-05 season.
• The Big Red was 0-4 to start a season for the first time since the 2006-07 squad went 0-7.
• Cornell played Pitt in front of a Big Red record 10,587 fans on the Panthers' School Day event. The crowd surpassed the Big Red's 2008 NCAA Tournament game vs. UConn by 4,000 fans. 
 
NCAA STATS:
• Cornell ranks inside the top 100 in fewest fouls (34th – 385), steals per game (82nd – 9.1) and turnovers forced per game (94th – 17.48).
• Samantha Widmann ranks 84th in steals per game (2.35).
• Samantha Widmann ranks 174th in field goal percentage (.449).
• Samantha Widmann ranks 211th in points per game (15.0).
• Danielle Jorgenson ranks 195th in assists per game (3.7).
• Janée Dennis'.889 (8-of-9) 3-poin­t FG percentage vs. Lafayette is the eighth best in the NCAA this season for a single game.
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PLAYER OF THE WEEK: Samantha Widmann earned the Big Red's first Ivy League Player of the Week award of the season, and the first of her career, when she took home the honor on Jan. 22. 
• Widmann earned the honor after leading Cornell to its first Ivy League win of the season with a 22-point, 12-rebound double-double at Columbia.
• Widmann was named Ivy Rookie of the Week twice during her freshman campaign.
 
CLOSE NON-CONFERENCE CALLS: In 11 of its 13 non-conference games, Cornell either held the lead, or was tied with its opponent at some point in the fourth quarter, including a pair of overtime decisions.
• Of those 11 games, the Big Red won four (Canisius, Stony Brook, UMass-Lowell, NJIT) with five of the losses (Colgate, Lehigh, Lafayette, Oakland, UNH) being decided by a combined total of just 15 points.
 
STATING STARTERS: The Big Red graduated all five starters from the 2016-17 squad.
• Cornell had five brand new starters to start a season for the first time in a season since the 2004-05 campaign. 
• Of Cornell's 20 opponents this season, 16 return at least three starters, including all seven Ivy League foes.
• Stony Brook (one starter), Drexel (two), UMass-Lowell (two) and Loyola (two) are the Big Red's only four opponents to return fewer than three starters.
• Nationwide, only Savannah State returns zero starters from the 2016-17 season.
• So far this season, Cornell has used four different starting line-ups, with just Danielle Jorgenson, Christine Ehland and Sam Widmann making all 23 starts.
 
WHAT WAS LOST: The Big Red graduated all five starters from the 2016-17 squad, and lost one other letter winner, as well as one non-letter winner. The seven players accounted for 82 percent of Cornell's points, 71 percent of the team's rebounds and 99 percent of the Big Red's assists.
 
WHAT REMAINS: Cornell returns four players that saw action in at least 15 games a year ago, including Samantha Widmann, the first forward off the bench in 17 contests and Christine Ehland, who returned from injury, to play in 17 of the final 20 games of the season.
• Widmann is the only Big Red returner to average more than 10.0 minutes per game during the 2016-17.
 
NEW KIDS ON THE BLOCK: The Big Red added five players to the 2017-18 squad, including the first-ever Ivy League transfer (Laura Bagwell-Katalinich, Penn) under Coach Smith.
• The group hails from four different states – California, Colorado, Minnesota, and Pennsylvania.
• The group consists of two forwards (Elodie Furey, Halley Miklos), two guards (Laura Bagwell-Katalinich, Kate Sramac) and one student-athlete that can play either position (Ariana Abdulmassih).
 
IVY PRESEASON RANKINGS: The Big Red was picked sixth overall in the 2017-18 Ivy League media preseason poll.
• Penn was selected to three-peat, as the Quakers garnered 129 points and 12 first-place votes to hold off Princeton, which totaled 120 points and five first-place votes.
• The four teams that earned spots in the inaugural Ivy League Women's Basketball Tournament were picked to return, as Harvard was selected to finish third with 98 points, followed by Brown in fourth with 87 points.
• Yale was picked to place fifth with 64 points, followed by Cornell (48), Columbia (42) and Dartmouth (24).
 
LIVE FROM ITHACA: The Big Red will have 24 of its regular season games broadcast on national or regional television networks and/or available on the Ivy League Network this season.
• A subscription to ILN, which is available through the ILN mobile app on Apple and Android devices as well as Apple TV and Roku, will get you 20 Big Red contests this coming season, including every home and away contest in the Ivy League 14-game round robin.
• Seven games will be broadcast on ESPN3 and one game will air on SNY via tape delay with all eight of those contests also being simulcast on ILN.
 
DON'T I KNOW YOU?: Shelby Lyman '14 has returned to Cornell as an assistant coach for the 2017-18 season.
• One of the most prolific 3-point shooters in Cornell history, Lyman returns to East Hill after a successful three-year stint as an assistant coach at Division III powerhouse St. John Fisher College, helping the Cardinals to an Empire 8 championship in 2015 and a pair of NCAA DIII Tournament appearances.  
• Lyman still ranks among the top 20 in Cornell history in assists (14th – 219), steals (14th – 122), and minutes played (13th – 3096). She finished her career with 718 career points.
• A native of Snohomish, Wash., Lyman earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Government, before obtaining an MBA from St. John Fisher.
 
HI! MY NAME IS: The Big Red has pair of newcomers on the sidelines as David Elliott (assistant coach) and Caroline Nuckolls (basketball operations) have joined Coach Smith's staff. 
• Elliott is a seven-year veteran of the collegiate coaching ranks, with stints at the University of Denver, Knox College, Columbia, and St. John Fisher College.
• A native of Arizona, Elliott received a bachelors' degree in microbiology from the University of Arizona in 2009, before going on to earn a masters' degree in organizational learning and human resource development from St. John Fisher College in 2012.
• Nuckolls brings seven years of Division I athletics experience to the position, having most recently served as the Women's Basketball graduate assistant at the University of Louisiana-Monroe for the past two seasons. 
• A native of Katy, Texas, Nuckolls graduated from LSU with a bachelor's degree in Sport and Fitness Administration/Management in 2014 before going on to obtain an Master's in Public Administration from ULM in 2017.
 
RECAPPING THE 2016-17 SEASON: Cornell finished the 2016-17 season in fourth place in the Ivy League standings with a record of 16-11 overall and 7-7 in the conference, the most wins and conference wins in a season since the 2007-08 team went 20-9 overall and 11-3 in the Ivy League.
• Following the season, Nia Marshall was named first-team All-Ivy, while Megan LeDuc took home honorable mention accolades.
 
UP NEXT: The Big Red remains on the road as it seeks a season-sweep of Brown on Saturday, Feb. 24 at 4 p.m.