Find a narrative, and North Dakota State has probably already lived it this season.
The 6-4 Bison have already packed plenty of distinct moments in 2022-23, from dramatic road victories and weeks and weeks of nothing but winning to dealing with an extended losing streak. Among those wins for a team featuring eight newcomers was an opening night victory at Montana, which Jory Collins reflected on in a recent interview.
“That was a great test, we had to handle some situations at the end,” he said. “You never know how that’s going to go with new players, young players, inexperienced players.”
While the longtime Bison coach may have been talking about the November win in Missoula, he may as well have been referencing the entire season. The Bison, led by program stalwart Heaven Hamling, have sprinkled in new players in key roles, such as freshman Elle Evans and American transfer Taylor Brown.
Despite recent struggles it has in the aggregate, like that Montana game, mostly come out positive for the Bison. Going forward, their up-and-down non-conference could be the underpinning of a competitive Summit League campaign.
Similar to recent seasons, it has begun with Hamling, who is off to an incredible start to her senior year. The former Stephen F. Austin transfer has continued to utilize her mix of ballhandling mastery and outside shooting to post a career high scoring average (15.3 ppg), the crown jewel of which was a 39-point outburst in a Nov. 27 win over Nevada. She credited offseason work off the court, which included a pushup competition with Collins, as part of the reason for her hot start.
“I just kind of took lifting to a new level and conditioning to a whole new level,” she said in a
Summit Peak Performer interview with Kienan Dixon. “Everything I did outside the gym is what is separating me this year.”
For Collins, part of the development in his star guard’s game has been the emergence of other players on the roster.
“She’s comfortable with people that are around her,” he said. “I think she trusts her teammates on this year’s team and doesn’t feel like she has to force things like she did in the past, she’s able to let some things come to her a little more. I think there’s a little pressure off of her.”
Like the team at large, the preseason all-league Summit first teamer has had a difficult last couple weeks, as NDSU is riding a four-game losing streak. All four of those games have been on the road and are part of a run of six straight games away from home. In total, the Bison will not have played a game at the Scheels Center since before Thanksgiving when they open their conference season against Western Illinois on Monday.
That can be the harsh reality of the non-conference.
“It’s never ideal to have six road games in a row especially in multiple cities in travel but that’s just our schedule this year,” Collins said about the recent run. “We’ve just been trying to maximize our rest, practice time and efficiency.”
Hidden behind that recent losing streak was the prolonged winning streak – six games – to begin the year. That included the dramatic win over the Grizzlies on opening night, as well as a power conference home win over Minnesota and clean sweep of Mountain West opponents (Boise State and Nevada) at the Nugget Classic in Reno. The Bison’s other Division I win – against Northern Colorado – was also a tidy one, with the Bears sitting just near the top-150 of the NET rankings.
Underpinning all that winning? A defense that has improved from a season ago.
“I’ve been pretty pleased with how we’ve defended for the most part, the effort is there and that’s a good thing,” Collins said. “If you look at our stats we’re fouling way too often and putting people at the line way too much and those are things we need to clean up in conference play.”
The numbers have dipped during recent weeks, but NDSU is still holding Division I opponents to fewer points per 100 possessions (94.4) than they were a season ago (99.8), and forcing more misses, posting lower defensive field goal percentage across the board. Collins conceded that the string of road games may have something to do with foul issues, but overall that’s also a product of a more aggressive approach on defense.
The emergence of Evans has also helped. The freshman guard has grown into the season offensively (12.5 ppg), and has flourished in big spots, such as scoring the winning points in the season-opening win over the Grizzlies. But most notably, she’s been a defensive bonus since day one, something that wasn’t hard for Collins to envision.
“You could really see it coming in, there are things about her like her size and length and athleticism, and her mentality and how fast she picks things up,” he said. “Her commitment to the defensive end is just phenomenal for a young player.”
Quality seasons from a pair of seasoned Bison – junior guard Abby Schulte (7.3 ppg) and juniors Emily Behnke (9.3 ppg, 5.6 rpg) – have helped round out the NDSU rotation. Brown, who played an important role in American’s run to the NCAA Tournament a year ago, has injected leadership and lived-in game experience into the program, which Collins said has been important with the loss of Emily Dietz – the program’s all-time leader in games played – to graduation (though Dietz is now on staff).
That mix of players has shown that it can win, and win big, this season. Hamling pointed to that depth when asked about what stands out about this current Bison team.
“Even if you don’t play the best personally you have good players around you that are helping the team win,” she said. “I think that’s what makes this team great right now, we’re giving everything we got, and if someone isn’t having a great game, there is someone else on the bench who is stepping up and filling in and providing for us.”
Despite a recent dip, an NDSU team picked fifth in the preseason poll starts fresh in conference play, having already shown it may well have the pieces to make noise.
