SANTA CLARA, Calif. — The Santa Clara University women's basketball team begins a month of December in which it plays six of seven games at home. That stretch starts with back-to-back home contests on Friday and Sunday at Leavey Center, first against Lincoln University (Calif.) and then coastal neighbor UC Santa Cruz.

THE MATCHUPS

Santa Clara (5-4) vs. Lincoln (Calif.) (2-7)
Santa Clara (5-4) vs. UC Santa Cruz (7-0)

GAME INFO

When: Friday, Dec. 2 • 6 p.m.
Where: Leavey Center
Video: WCC Network
Live Stats: StatBroadcast

When: Sunday, Dec. 4 • 2 p.m.
Where: Leavey Center
Video: WCC Network
Live Stats: StatBroadcast

SERIES HISTORY

Santa Clara and Lincoln University (Calif.) have never faced each other before. Lincoln started its athletics department in 2021-22.

Santa Clara is 4-0 all-time against UC Santa Cruz. The last meeting was a 109-51 Santa Clara win in Santa Clara, Calif., on Nov. 5, 2019.

NOTES

• The Broncos made waves Wednesday even in defeat with a spectacular effort against the No. 2 team in the country, as they drove up El Camino Real to revive a series versus 2021 national champion Stanford that hadn't been played for seven years. The Cardinal won, 82-69, but Santa Clara scored the second-most points allowed by the Cardinal this season, hit the most 3-pointers Stanford has allowed (13) and held the No. 2 team in the country to its worst 3-point shooting percentage (27.3%) of the year. The 13-point margin of victory was Stanford's smallest in nine wins, more than 10 points smaller than the next smallest victory margin (24).
• The Broncos will try to start another winning streak Friday after their short three-game streak ended Wednesday at Stanford. The Broncos have still won four of their last six after beginning the year 1-2 at home. Before their most recent three-game streak last week, Santa Clara last won three in a row on Feb. 12-17, 2022 – a streak that also included two games away from Leavey Center.
• Freshman guard Tess Heal has won each of the year's first three West Coast Conference Freshman of the Week awards. No Santa Clara player had ever earned the honor in the first two years of its existence (since 2020-21). Only two other players have ever won it three times in a row – San Francisco's Ioanna Krimili (two occasions in 2020-21) and Pacific's Anaya James (2021-22).
• Heal hasn't only been the best freshman in the WCC through three weeks – she's been one of the best freshmen in the country. She entered the week as the highest-scoring freshman (17.4 points per game) among all six Division I conferences on the West Coast (WCC, Pac-12, Mountain West, Big West, Big Sky, WAC). She was the fifth-highest scoring freshman in the nation through Monday, and she was tied for seventh among NCAA Division I freshmen with 4.1 assists per game.
• Santa Clara defeated Washington, 71-58, on Saturday to conclude the Las Vegas Holiday Classic with a perfect 2-0 record. It was the Broncos' first win over the Huskies in 21 years almost to the day and by almost the exact same score. The Broncos last beat UW on Nov. 24, 2001, in Seattle, 71-56. It was Santa Clara's first win over a Pac-12 Conference member since Nov. 23, 2015, when it beat Stanford on the road, 61-58.
• The Broncos' unblemished trip to Las Vegas also marked the first time they went unbeaten in a non-conference tournament in seven years. They last went 2-0 at Cal Poly's 2015 ShareSLO Holiday Tournament in San Luis Obispo on Nov. 27-28, 2015.
• Head coach Bill Carr is 14 wins away from his 300th career victory, and 16 wins away from his 100th as the head coach of the Santa Clara women's program. Carr spent 11 years from 1999-2016 as the head coach of three different NAIA and NCAA Division II men's basketball programs, amassing 202 wins along the way. He's won 84 games at Santa Clara, matching his highest total at any of his men's coaching stops (84 at Spring Hill College, 1999-2002).
• Carr, the eighth head coach in program history, is the fourth-winningest head coach of all-time for Broncos women's basketball. He trails No. 3 Ken Thompson, who coached SCU from 1978-88 and collected 112 victories.
• Santa Clara posted its second consecutive winning season in 2021-22 – the first time the Broncos had logged consecutive winning campaigns in 16 years. The Broncos have won at least 12 games in five of head coach Bill Carr's six years at the helm. They'll be looking to log their third straight winning season in 2022-23 for the first time in 20 years – since the program wrapped up a run of 13 straight winning years in 2002-03.
• The Broncos' regular season success has also shown through in the postseason the last two years. Santa Clara reached the West Coast Conference Tournament quarterfinals in 2022 with back-to-back wins in the first and second rounds. That came a year after they reached the semifinals in 2021.
• Santa Clara's 2022-23 roster features eight players who haven't played for the Broncos in at least a year – that includes six newcomers who have never donned an SCU jersey, and returners Ashlee Maldonado and Lexie Pritchard, who are both returning from season-long injuries.
• Santa Clara's six newcomers include three freshmen and three transfers. The trio of transfers feature senior guard Azhiana Basallo, a San Francisco native who comes to the South Bay from Arizona State via San Jose State and Cal Poly, sophomore forward Olivia Pollerd from Washington of the Pac-12 Conference, and junior guard Jayde Cadee out of UC Irvine. The rookies include 6-foot, 3-inch forward Georgia Grigiripoulou from Athens, Greece, 5-10 guard Tess Heal out of Melbourne, Australia, and 6-0 guard Marya Hudgins out of Aurora, Colo.
• Heal played with the Australia U18 Women's National Team in India during early September at the FIBA U18 Women's Asian Championship. She helped the Gems not only qualify for the 2023 FIBA U19 Women's World Cup, but was also part of the team's first-ever championship at the event, as the Gems went undefeated to hoist the trophy.

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