LARAMIE, Wyo. — All eyes are on the University of Wyoming Cowgirls, including Fox Sports 1, tonight at 8:30 p.m. as the team is set to take on conference regular-season champion UNLV at home for the final game of the regular season.
The stakes aren’t as high for the Lady Rebels, as they have far-and-away exceed the requirements to take the top seed in the Mountain West championship tournament. The Cowgirls however, are just one loss shy from matching Colorado State University’s conference record.
But if anyone in the Mountain West can get it done against a team currently projected to appear in March Madness, it’s the Cowgirls.
They are coming off of their biggest win of the season: a huge double-digit upset against, fittingly, Colorado State. This was a rivalry game; the first win for the Cowgirls in Fort Collins since 2020; and a statement from Wyoming star Allyson Fertig as to why she has more claim to the MW Player of the Year title than fellow contender Emma Ronsiek. The Cowgirls would keep CSU to just 22 points in the entire second half to pull away with the lead and win 68–55.
Fertig herself also holds her own in talks about player rankings through the entire NCAA. According to UW Athletics, she is one of just 25 female hoopers in the entire United States to be averaging a double-double. She is currently tied with Florida State’s Makayla Timpson for 12th in the country in rebounds per game.
As a squad, the Cowgirls lead the Mountain West in field goal percentage (48.7%) and assists per game (17.2). They rank third in three-point percentage (35.8%).
All that is to say that Wyoming has already proven so much this season. Head coach Heather Ezell has a winning formula with some elite players — not aforementioned here are also players like Malene Pederson and Emily Mellema. In her third year as head coach — in her first year she set a program record for most wins in a season — the Cowgirls are consistently better than any point in modern program history.
Tonight the question is, can the Cowgirls prove themselves even more? The nice thing about playing the four-time reigning MW champion UNLV is that there are going to be lots of eyeballs on the Arena-Auditorium tonight. Being nationally televised on Fox Sports 1 means that tonight could be the Cowgirls’ most-watched win of the entire year, setting quite the precedent for the MW championship tournament.
Tip-off is at 8:30 p.m. tonight in the Arena-Auditorium. The game will be available to watch, due its nationally televised status, on Fox Sports 1. For more information on the UW Cowgirls, see their page on the UW Athletics website.
