Nov. 12, 2014
San Jose, Calif. - The San José State women's basketball team opens head coach Jamie Craighead's second season at Pac-12 opponent the Utah Utes. It will be the first time these programs have faced each other in 16 years.
GAME 1
at Utah (0-0)
Friday, November 14, 5:00 p.m.
Jon M. Huntsman Center, Salt Lake City, Utah
Streaming video is available on the Pac-12 Digital Network at www.pac-12.com/videos/university_utah
Live stats available at www.sjsuspartans.com
LIVE STATS
Fans can view live stats of all San José State women's basketball games, home and away, by accessing the "Gametracker" feature at www.sjsuspartans.com. Click on the link on the women's basketball schedule page to follow the action.
VIDEO STREAMING
Spartan Digital is your all-access passport to Spartan Athletics. For live and recorded video/audio of San José State women's basketball home, Mountain West (road and home) and select road contests, Spartan Digital is your home. Go to Spartan Digital at top of the Spartans Athletics home page or go to www.sjsuspartans.com/video.
SOCIAL MEDIA
Keep up with all 16 of San José State's team through social media sites Twitter and Facebook. For Twitter go to @sjsuathletics and on Facebook become friends with Sammy Spartan.
The women's basketball Twitter handle is @sjswbb and Facebook page is /SanJoseStateWBB.
RADIO COVERAGE
Fans across the nation can now listen to every Spartans' women's home game via Stretch Internet Radio. KSJS-FM (90.5 FM, San Jose) also originates home broadcasts and select road contests.
WOMEN'S BASKETBALL TICKETS
Tickets for San José State women's basketball home games are free for all SJSU students with a valid student ID. Adult tickets are $5.00 and $3.00 for youth (12 and under). Groups of 20 or more can buy discounted tickets at $3.00 per person by 5:00 p.m. the business day before the game via the Spartan Ticket Office at (408) 924-SJTX (7589) or (877) SJSUTIX (757-8849).
The Event Center Box Office opens two hours prior to tip-off for any weekend, holiday game or doubleheader and is open regular business hours (10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.) for weekday games or weekday doubleheaders.
PARKING
Parking for all San José State women's basketball games is in the University's Seventh Street Parking Garage. The Seventh Street Garage, located on the Northwest corner of San Salvador Street and Seventh Street, can be accessed through Seventh Street. Parking is $5.00.
CUNNIGAN NAMED PRESEASON ALL-CONFERENCE BY MOUNTAIN WEST COACHES
Ta'Rea Cunnigan (Sr., G, Winchester, Calif.) is one of five players to be named the Mountain West Preseason All-Conference team by a vote of the conference's head coaches. This is the second straight year Cunnigan has received the honor.
Cunnigan, averaged 18.4 points per game last year and is the leading scorer among all returning players in the Mountain West Conference this year. She led the team in scoring and steals and ranked second in blocks, assists, free throw percentage and 3-point percentage.
She was the second leading scorer in the Mountain West Conference last year and earned honorable mention All-Mountain West honors after the season.
SEASON OPENERS A 50-50 PROPOSITION
San José State has played 39 season openers and has split them right down the center - 20 wins and 19 losses. Only three of seven head coaches, Sharon Chatman (in 1976-77),Tina Krah (in 1986-87), and Jamie Craighead (in 2013-14) have begun their Spartans career with a win in their first game. Chatman had seven season-opening victories in her 10 years at the helm of the San José State program (1977-86), the most in Spartans history. The late Janice Richard won six of her seven season openers as the Spartans head coach (1999-2006).
ROAD OPENING WINS HARD TO COME BY
In the last 10 years, the Spartans are just 2-8 in their first game on the road. The team defeated Santa Clara 97-93 last year, but have to go back to 2004-05 and a 54-52 win at UC Irvine for their last win in the team's first road game.
SINGLE-SEASON MARKS FELL IN 2013-14 SCORING MARK SET
The 2013-14 San José State women's basketball set the program's single-season record for points at 2,308. They eclipsed the previous record, 2,301 points, which was set in 1979-80.
SCOUTING UTAH
The Utes finished 2013-14 with an overall record of 12-19, 4-14 in Pac-12 play. They return 10 letterwinners from last year and thee of their starting five.
Utah lost to Alaska Anchorage 67-61 in an exhibition game last week. Maila Nawahine, a sophomore, led the team with 15 points and seven rebounds. Senior Taryn Wicijowski, returning from an ACL injury which kept her out last year, led the team with nine rebounds and dished out six assists.
Anthony Leverts is in his fifth season leading the Utes program. He brings a 69-63 record into the season.
CUNNIGAN FOURTH ON ALL-TIME SCORING LIST
Ta'Rea Cunnigan (Sr., G, Winchester, Calif.) has scored 1,495 career points and is in 4th place on the Spartans career-scoring list. On a layup with 1:49 to play in the first half at Air Force (2/12), she moved ahead Hulett Brooks (1990, 92-94 1,373 pts.) for the fourth spot on the list. On her first bucket against NEV (2/19), she become just fourth player in the Spartans' 38-year history to reach the 1,400-point plateau.
Cunnigan was the 13th player to reach the 1,000-point plateau in the game against UC Riverside (11/15). She accomplished the feat in 63 games, the second fastest in program history.
MILESTONES DEAD AHEAD
With five points, Ta'Rea Cunnigan (Sr., G, Winchester, Calif.) will become the fourth player in San José State women's basketball history to reach 1,500 points for her career.
She begins 2014-15, 265 points from tying Karen Mason for the program's all-time scoring record, 1,760, and then is just seven points for the school's career scoring leader (male or female), Ricky Berry who finished his Spartans' career with 1,767 points
THREES ARE THE NAME OF THE GAME
With 793 3-point attempts and 245 makes, the 2013-14 Spartans shattered the program's previous marks in each category. San José State sank 146 3-pointers in the 27 games of the 1999-00 season. Last year's team equaled that number in just 20 games (at UNLV 1/29). In addition, they passed the previous record for attempts in a season (493 in 29 games in 2000-01) in that same game.
Both marks set Mountain West Conference records as well. Fresno State held the single-season and conference season records.
IF THEY'VE GOT THE THREE THEY'LL TAKE IT
When the Spartans launched 42 3-pointers at San Diego State (1/25), they set a San José State single game and a Mountain West Conference record. They broke the program's previous record of 36, which was set against USF (11/20/14) and the previous MW record of 41 set by Wyoming at Colorado State (1/28/05).
San José State had four of the top six 3-point shooting games in the MW last year and four of the top five in conference games.
CUNNIGAN IN TOP-10 OF SEVEN MORE CAREER CATEGORIES
The fourth-leading scorer in program history, Ta'Rea Cunnigan (Sr., G, Winchester, Calif.) is also in the top-10 of seven other San José State career categories.
She ranks 2nd in both free throws (425) and free throw attempts (576), trailing only Cricket Williams (2001-04) in both categories. Cunnigan is 41 free throws and 156 free throw attempts from tying Williams in each category.
She ranks 5th in career free throw percentage (.738) and steals (204). She is 22 steals from tying Kari Steele (1994-97) for fourth place on the program's all-time steals list.
In San José State history, Cunnigan ranks 7th in 3-point attempts (337) and 6th in makes (104). She is 10 3-pointers from tying Cricket Williams (2001-04) for 5th place in career makes.
Lastly she checks in 8th place for field goals made (483) and in attempts (1,253).
WOODBERRY SET 3-POINT SHOOTING MARKS
In 2013-14, her first season as a Spartan, Rebecca Woodberry (Sr., F, Phoenix, Ariz.) set numerous 3-point shooting record for both the team and the Mountain West Conference.
Woodberry shattered the program records for 3-point attempts with 251 and 3-pointers made with 90. The previous record for attempts belonged to Jessica Kellogg who put up 212 treys in the 2002-03 season. The 3-point field goals made record had belonged to Kari Steele who in the 1996-97 season made 74.
Her 46 made 3-pointers in Mountain West play are a conference record for a junior and the fourth most by any player in conference history. She also set the record for most 3-point attempts with 138 in conference action.
With her 2013-14 season, she moved into the top-10 of both the career 3-pointers made and 3-pointers attempted for San José State women's basketball.
PAC-12 IS NO PICNIC
Since the 2008-09 season the Spartans played Pac-12 schools five times. In those contests San José State is just 1-4. The lone win came in the 2009-10 season when they traveled to Berkeley and defeated California 68-66.