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INDIANAPOLIS - The second half of the Summit League season begins for the Jaguars on Saturday, Jan. 31, when IUPUI welcomes Omaha to The Jungle.

GAMEDAY INFORMATION

• Saturday's tip is slated for 3 p.m. ET at The Jungle.
• Free live streaming of the game will be provided through IUPUIJags.com, and Morgan Adcock will have the call beginning just prior to tip.
• Live stats will also be provided through IUPUIJags.com.
• Upon completion of Saturday's game, the Jags will also sign autographs for the fans.

ABOUT OMAHA

• The Mavericks are coming off an 11-point loss at Fort Wayne on Thursday, which dropped their record to 6-14 overall and 1-7 in The Summit League.
• That one win, however, did come against the Jaguars two weeks ago, 66-49. That was a game in which the Jags played without their two top scorers in Nevena Markovic and Akilah Sims.
• The Mavs are scoring 60.8 ppg on the season, and they are led by Mikaela Shaw and her 12.6 ppg. Omaha has another double-figure scorer in Brianna Bogard (11.2 ppg).
• Shaw also serves as the team's leading rebounder at 9.0 rpg.
• The Mavericks have two of the top defenders in the league in terms of steals and blocks in Lanese Bough and Taijhe Kelly. Bough's 2.2 spg and Kelly's 3.2 bpg rank first and second in the conference, respectively.
• Thanks in part to Bough and Kelly, the Mavs rank second in the conference in opponent's field goal percentage (38.1 percent).

THE SERIES WITH THE MAVERICKS

• Saturday's meeting will be the sixth all-time, and IUPUI owns a 4-1 edge in the series.
• Omaha did win the last meeting back on Jan. 17, 66-49, behind 13 points from Remy Davenport.

LAST TIME OUT ...

• Akilah Sims matched a career-high with 20 points and Nevena Markovic recorded a double-double, but it wasn't enough to dig the IUPUI women's basketball team out of an early deficit as the Jaguars dropped a 73-62 decision to Western Illinois at Western Hall Thursday night.
• Poor shooting put the Jags in an 18-point hole 12 minutes in, but they rallied to make it a six-point game at the half. The IUPUI deficit dwindled to five a minute into the second half and despite runs by both teams the Jags only trailed by six with 3:37 to go. But the Leathernecks made the plays down the stretch to improve to 13-8 overall and 5-3 in the Summit League, while the Jags fell to 9-12 overall and 4-4 in the league.
• IUPUI won the turnover battle and the battle of the boards thanks in part to 18 offensive caroms, but it came down to field goal shooting and despite getting up 20 more shots, the Jags made four fewer field goals than WIU as IUPUI finished the game shooting 29.9 percent while the Leathernecks shot at a 51.1-percent clip.
• Sims' 20 points marked her third-straight double-digit scoring performance since coming back from an injury, while Kelsi Byrd, Markovic and Danielle Lawrence also reached double figures with 13, 12 and 10 points, respectively. Ashley Luke led Western Illinois with 23 points and 10 boards.
• The score was tied at seven three and a half minutes in, but the Jaguars defense, which had been exceptional over the past two games, disappeared for the next nine minutes.
• During that stretch, the Leathernecks went on a 21-3 run to open a 28-10 cushion, and through the first 12-plus minutes Western Illinois appeared like it would run away with the game shooting 70 percent from the floor compared to just 15 percent for the Jags.
• Despite the deficit, the Jags got an old-fashioned three-point play from Lawrence with 6:39 on the clock and that kick-started the IUPUI offense.
• Two Leathernecks free throws following the Lawrence three-point play put them up 30-13, but an 11-0 Jags run over a three-minute stretch brought them within six, 30-24, with 2:48 to go. The run featured six points from Sims and five from Markovic.
• In the final minutes of the first half, the teams alternated baskets and that six-point lead held for Western Illinois as it took a 36-30 lead into the break.
• A Sims bucket a minute into the second half inched the Jags within five, but five points from Luke during an 13-point Leathernecks surge opened up a 49-32 lead by the first media timeout.
• By the 12:15 mark the Jags had again trimmed their deficit to single-digits, 51-42, following a Byrd three-point play, and two minutes later a Sims triple followed a WIU bucket shrinking the Leathernecks lead to 53-45.
• Western Illinois retaliated with an 8-0 run, only to have IUPUI go on a 12-2 run that was capped off by a Markovic three to make the deficit six, 63-57, with 3:37 remaining. However, Michelle Maher scored the next four points and the Jags couldn't muster another rally before eventually falling, 73-62.

SCORING IN BUNCHES

• Since returning from injury on Jan. 22, against Denver, Akilah Sims has turned into IUPUI's most effective scorer.
• Beginning with the game against the Pioneers, Sims scored 12 points in 12 minutes, while dishing out a career-high tying four assists to help the Jags earn a 17-point win.
• She followed that with a 17-point effort in a convincing 25-point win over Summit League leader South Dakota.
• The scoring production went up another notch against Western Illinois on Jan. 31 when she scored a career-high tying 20 points.
• In Summit League play, Sims leads the Jaguars in scoring at 13.4 ppg, and over the last three games she is averaging 16.3 ppg while shooting at a 50.0 percent clip (16-of-32) from the floor.
• If Sims records a double-figure scoring outing against the Mavericks on Saturday, it would mark the first time in her career that she would post four consecutive double-digit scoring performances.

• LAWRENCE BEGINNING TO EMERGE
• Freshman point guard Danielle Lawrence got off to a slow start this season averaging 3.6 ppg and 2.9 turnovers per game through the first 19 games.
• Over the last two games, however, last year's Kentucky Sweet 16 MVP has started to emerge for the Jags.
• Over the last two games, Lawrence is averaging 8.5 ppg, and she has been most effective at scoring from the free throw line.
• Lawrence has got to the line 13 times over the last two games and converted nine of those tries.
• The most impressive stat for the point guard over the last two games is that her turnovers have dropped drastically as she has committed just three in 53 minutes of action.

MILESTONE WATCH

• Heading into the last game of January, senior Nevena Markovic is climbing up two of IUPUI's career charts.
• Markovic has scored 979 points in her career, and she has grabbed 614 rebounds.
• She needs just 21 points to become the 21st player in program history to reach 1,000 career points, and she is 18 rebounds away from breaking into the Top 10 on IUPUI's career rebounding chart.
• She already ranks third in IUPUI history in blocks with 116.