Women’s – Saturday, February 9 - 1:00 p.m.

Coach Brian Cheng’s team comes into Saturday’s matinee match-up with the Laurier Golden Hawks riding on a wave of momentum having beaten their past two opponents by a combined 63 points – including a 73-30 dismantling of Laurier’s crosstown rivals, Waterloo.

With only three games left on the schedule for both teams – including the regular season finale between the two teams at Laurier on the 16th – now will be the time for either team to lay claim to the third seed in the OUA West division. Laurier sits just one win behind Western; a big road victory for the Golden Hawks would give the teams identical 10-9 records.

The game has been declared this year’s Senior Day. Fittingly, Western’s only true senior will be on showcase when guard Jenny Vaughan and her OUA-leading 19.5 points per game takes the court against a tough Laurier defence.

Laurier’s toughest test will be finding scoring opportunities against a Mustang team that locked down a similarly-skilled McMaster team just last weekend. Hurting the Golden Hawk’s case will be the lack of a true go-to scoring presence like Vaughan; Laurier lacks a single player in the top-20 in scoring in the OUA.

Coach Cheng will be pushing his players to finish the last home-game of the regular season strong with a hard-fought win over the visiting Golden Hawks.
 
Men’s – Saturday, February 9 - 3:00 p.m.

The season will not get any easier for a men’s side whose season has decidedly been more about growth in the younger players than the team’s record. Western ranks last in the country in scoring per game with an average of 64.7 points. Luckily for the Mustangs, the Golden Hawks sport the country’s second-worst defense, allowing 86.5 points per game.

Laurier has built itself as an offense-first squad, relying on the OUA’s leading-scorer in Maxwell Allin and his 22.1 points per game and the OUA’s seventh-best scorer William Coulthard and his 18.6 points per game to drive the team.

Allin may be one of the most complete players in the OUA, combining his robust scoring – buoyed largely by his adept three-point shooting – with the OUA’s third-best rebounding average, 9.5 per game. The fourth-year guard should garner significant recognition by way of an All-OUA Team selection, despite Laurier’s middling 5-13 record.

The Mustangs’ men’s side lacks a true fourth-year senior for Senior Day, denoting the myriad examples of youth on coach Brad Campbell’s team. Despite having no Senior Day players look for forward Peter Scholtes and guard Quinn Henderson, the two third-year players that stand as the longest tenured current Mustangs in the program, to help lead the team in their final home game of the regular season.