LARAMIE, Wyo. — The families made trips from Australia, Poland and Washington and familiar drives from Douglas and Lyman; season ticket holders took their naps and turned out for the late-night tip time; and the student body showed up early and shouted late as Wyoming honored six seniors before defeating reigning Mountain West champion UNLV 71–66 on a memorable Wednesday night at the Arena-Auditorium.
The crowd of 3,601 brought the Dome of Doom back to life and helped the Cowgirls make a statement about how strong the program’s culture remains under head coach Heather Ezell.
“What an atmosphere,” Ezell said after UW finished the regular season with its ninth win over the final 10 games. “So much credit to all the fans that were able to come out. Man, that was a fun women’s basketball game out there that national television got to see.
“I know our players are going, ‘Heck yeah, this is where we play.'”
Senior center Allyson Fertig made her closing argument for MW player of the year with 16 points and 19 rebounds, senior guard Emily Mellema finished with 17 points on 6-for-9 shooting and six rebounds and junior guard Malene Pedersen poured in 27 points to lead UW to the victory over the Rebels.
“It wasn’t very emotional for us because we know we have so much more work to do, so much more basketball to play and we know this isn’t our last game ever together,” Mellema said of the senior night ceremony. “It’s obviously our last game with these fans and we’re really thankful for their support, and doing it here at home is really special. Less emotions with it being our last time with our six seniors. We’re excited we have more work to do in the next two weeks.”
The second-seeded Cowgirls (20–10, 14–4) will pack confidence, experience and momentum for Las Vegas, where they will open the MW Tournament against the No. 7 Air Force-No. 10 Utah State winner at 6 p.m. Monday at the Thomas & Mack Center.
UW swept the Falcons during the regular season and defeated the Aggies 73–53 in the only meeting back on Jan. 1.
During their current four-game winning streak, the Cowgirls went on a 17–0 run to close a 45–42 comeback win at Nevada, held New Mexico to 31.9% shooting in a 59–40 win, outscored Colorado State by 14 points in the second half of a 68–55 Border War win in Fort Collins and snapped UNLV’s eight-game winning streak.
“These seniors, they’re not satisfied. This whole team is not satisfied,” Ezell said. “We sat in that huddle in that last two and a half seconds, and they said, ‘We’re going to finish this, but we’re not done. Let’s get our minds right to go into next week and compete for a championship.'”
Two seniors, Ola Ustowska and McKinley Dickerson, were on UW’s 2021 MW Tournament championship team. Senior guard Joslin Igo joined the program last season after a successful two-year stint at Casper College.
Tess Barnes is the other member of the dynamic 2021 recruiting class along with Fertig and Mellema. The trio have won 78 games together during their four seasons in the brown and gold.
“You look at us six [seniors], we love Cowgirl basketball,” Mellema said. “I think that’s something that’s being lost in college basketball right now. We love to play for our coaches, we love to play for our state, we love to play for each other and we’re loyal and committed to this team. That’s showing right now. You have girls that stick it out for all four years, and it helps when you have Allyson Fertig in your class, that’s pretty nice.”
“If we leave anything, obviously quite a few wins, but good culture, and we’re trying to carry that on for the people who did that before us,” she said.
