Feb. 28—MITCHELL — The Dakota Wesleyan University women's basketball team will play in the Great Plains Athletic Conference championship game for the first time in four years.
The Tigers scored 31 points in the first quarter and 70 in the first three quarters, racing past Hastings 86-68 on Saturday during the Great Plains Athletic Conference semifinals at the Corn Palace.
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementDWU (24-6) will take on top-seeded Dordt (29-1) at 7 p.m. Tuesday in Sioux Center, Iowa, which is the Tigers' first berth in a GPAC title game since 2022, when the Tigers last won the league tournament.
Rylee Rosenquist led the Tigers with 23 points and Shalayne Nagel scored 21 for DWU, which improved to 14-1 in home games this season. Avery Broughton added 19 points for the Tigers, who made 11 of their first 12 shots from the field, their first six 3-pointers and shot 70% from the field in the first 20 minutes. DWU finished shooting 62.7% on field goals in the game.
Hastings (22-8) was kept to 34% shooting in the game. The Broncos had 16 points each from Ann Bose, Bailey Kissinger and Josilyn Miller.
The win also essentially clinched a berth in the 64-team NAIA national tournament. Dordt already has one of the GPAC's two automatic berths to the tournament by virtue of being regular-season champions in the conference. The second bid goes to either the GPAC tournament champion or the league's regular-season runner-up, which will be DWU in either case.
This story will be updated.
AdvertisementAdvertisement