Vancouver – The UBC open the post season this weekend by welcoming the Winnipeg Wesmen to the west coast where they'll host the one-game winner takes all Canada West play in game for the right to advance to quarter final playoff action. The T-Birds finished the regular season with a 14-6 record good for fifth place in the standings while the Wesmen 8-12 completed the campaign in 12^th overall spot.
 
The contest is set for Saturday, February 9 with an early 2:00 p.m. tipoff at War Memorial Gym.
 
The last time these two teams met was 15 months ago in late November of 2017 where the Wesmen were able to sweep the weekend series on home court over the 'Birds by scores of 78-71, and 71-52.


 

Last Action

 
In the final weekend of the regular season, UBC came away with a series split against the fourth place Alberta Pandas, dropping the opening game 84-73 before bouncing back in a thrilling roller coaster 90-85 overtime victory last Saturday night.
 
The Wesmen halted a three-game slide with back to back home victories over the Manitoba Bisons to finish the regular season on a high note.


 

Players to Watch

 
Keylyn Filewich - (#9, F) The second-year forward continued her trend of averaging double doubles in each contest combining for 54 points and 20 rebounds last weekend in Alberta. This includes a game high 31 points and 10 rebounds in Saturday night's victory. The Winnipeg native finished atop the Canada West standings with a 60.3 field goal percentage while finishing fourth overall in average points per game with 18.4.
 
Maddison Penn – (#15, G) The fourth-year guard combined for 29 points and 11 rebounds last weekend in Alberta and also finished the season averaging double doubles. The native of Avoca Beach, Australia finished in third overall spot in Canada West rebounds averaging 10.2 per game and 12^th overall in scoring averaging 16.1 points per game.


 

Coach's Take

 
"I think there's a lot of parity in the league and I think last week demonstrated that," said UBC head coach Deb Huband. "I think both games could have gone either way so it was appropriate that we split on the road where it's tough to play. I think we had a solid performance for parts of Friday but overall better for Saturday and I think it prepared us well for playoffs this weekend where it's just one game, there's no warmup game so we have to be prepared to have a strong 40 minutes."
 
Huband also previewed what to expect from the visiting Wesmen.
 
"The Wesmen have had a bit of an up and down season," added Huband. "But they have one of the most dominant players in Canada West (forward Faith Hezekiah) who leads the conference in scoring (23.8 ppg) and is second in rebounding (10.3 rpg) averages a double double and gets lots of opportunity with the offence generating a lot of shots for her. They also have some strong role players who shoot the ball well plus they have a unique style of defence which you have to read well as a team in order to execute your offence the way you want to. I think it will be an interesting matchup and we're starting the second season and we want to put our best foot forward, be prepared and sharp minute by minute."