Northern Michigan University’s Alyssa Nimz, left, and Bemidji State’s Tieryn Plasch, right, go after a loose ball during their women’s college basketball game played at Vandament Arena in Marquette on Saturday, Nov. 16, 2024. (Photo courtesy Cara Kamps)

By Journal Sports Staff

MARQUETTE — The “Alyssa” show did some nice work for the Northern Michigan University women’s basketball team to begin its weekend in Minnesota, then it was the veteran “Newcomer” who starred a day later.

It all worked out to a sweep for the Wildcats on their two-day, two-game trip to Minnesota as NMU posted a 65-63 win at Minnesota-Duluth, then a 63-52 victory at St. Cloud State.

Northern improved to 6-0 and gets “rewarded” with just what a hot team doesn’t want — time off. The Wildcats don’t play for nearly two weeks, when they resume action that begins their GLIAC season at home on Thursday, Dec. 5. At 5:30 p.m. that day, NMU hosts Purdue Northwest, then at noon on Saturday, Dec. 7, the Wildcats entertain Wisconsin-Parkside.

Those will be Northern’s only home games until more than a week into the new year when the NMU hosts Michigan Tech on Thursday, Jan. 9.

Here are details from the Minnesota trip:

NMU 65, Minn.-Duluth 63

On Saturday in Duluth, Minn., the two Alyssas — Alyssa Nimz and Alyssa Hill — combined to score 30 points and pull down 18 rebounds as the Wildcats made up a six-point deficit in the final 6 1/2 minutes.

But the Wildcats didn’t put it out of reach until Sarah Newcomer — the statistical star of the weekend’s other game — sank two free throws with 0.9 of a second still showing on the clock to break a 63-63 tie.

Her free throws were set up when Jacy Weisbrod took a jump shot that missed. Newcomer crashed the glass for the offensive rebound and was fouled on the putback try.

Duluth inbounded the ball after that and tried a desperation 3-pointer that missed the mark.

Nimz set up that late scenario by sharing top scoring honors in the game with 17 points — her career high — as she made 8 of 12 from the field, adding in nine rebounds.

Hill contributed 13 points, hitting 6 of 9 shots and also grabbing nine rebounds. She is a former Negaunee High School star who transferred from Bemidji State (Minnesota) during the offseason.

Weisbrod pumped in 12 points, while CJ Romero tacked on six assists to a four-point day.

The Bulldogs had a pair of 17-point scorers in Myra Moorjani and Johanna Miller.

The Wildcats didn’t take their first lead until the fourth quarter was more than half over. Romero made a layup that put her team ahead 59-57 with 4:29 remaining.

Prior to that, the best Northern could do was tie the score three times. After the Bulldogs jumped out to a 13-4 lead near the midpoint of the opening quarter, the Wildcats worked their way back into their first tie at 17-17 with 6:39 remaining in the first half on a Nimz layup.

UMD sprinted away again, working its lead into double digits about 4 1/2 minutes later at 28-17, then settling for a 30-23 advantage at halftime.

The Bulldogs built their biggest lead, 35-23, with 8:31 left in the third and still held onto a 49-44 edge entering the final period.

That’s when the Wildcats really got down to business. They tied it at 49-49 and 57-57, the latter setting up Romero’s go-ahead bucket shortly after.

Neither team had more than a two-point lead over the final five minutes as Hill made a pair of baskets in the final 2:37, the last one coming with 26 seconds left that put NMU ahead 63-62.

Duluth’s Lexi Karge then made 1 of 2 free throws with 19 seconds to go to knot the score and set up Newcomer’s heroics at the free throw line.

NMU 63, St. Cloud 52

On Sunday in St. Cloud, Minnesota, Newcomer was the “old hand on deck,” scoring a game-high 22 points as she made 8 of 11 shots from the field, including 6 of 8 on triples. She also handed out a game-high five assists while snaring four rebounds and making two steals to hand the Huskies (3-1) their first loss.

Nimz contributed 16 points and a team-high nine rebounds, making no turnovers in 33 minutes court time. Weisbrod added 12 points on a quartet of 3s as she also had five rebounds, three assists and two steals.

Jada Eggebrecht paced St. Cloud with 16 points, while Abigail O’Reilly had 10 points and 10 rebounds.

Newcomer willed her team into the lead for good in the latter stages of the third quarter. After the teams had traded spurts and the lead a number of times over the first 2 1/2 quarters, Newcomer sank three consecutive triples over a span of 54 seconds to turn St. Cloud’s 39-36 lead into a 45-39 advantage for the Wildcats.

NMU’s lead never got smaller than that the remaining 12 minutes of the game.

The Huskies got off to a fast start, grabbing an 8-0 lead less than two minutes in following triples by Eggebrecht and Alana Zarneke.

With Northern still trailing 12-9 after one quarter, Newcomer tied the score 12-12 on a 3 just 26 seconds into the second period, while Nimz made a free throw and Sydney Whitehouse hit a triple to give NMU a 16-12 edge a couple minutes later.

The teams traded the lead for the rest of the first half, Northern emerging on top at halftime 27-24 when Weisbrod hit a trey five seconds before the intermission buzzer.

St. Cloud hit a hot streak in the middle of the third quarter, using a 7-0 run to go up 37-32 with 5:11 remaining. That was just before Newcomer hit her own personal hot streak.

Leading 48-39 entering the fourth, Northern only increased its lead, reaching a high-water mark of 13 points three times over the final five minutes.

Information compiled by Journal Sports Editor Steve Brownlee. His email address is sbrownlee@miningjournal.net.