WBB Preview: Utah State Heads To Laramie For New Year's Day Matchup

After hosting Colorado State to open conference play, Utah State is back on the road to play the other half of the Border War Rivalry, the Wyoming Cowboys. It was a nice reprieve to have two games at home after an eight-game road trip, but the Aggies are still looking for their first road win of the year, and will try to nab it on Wednesday.

The Aggies have a unique challenge ahead of them as they face their second opponent with a preseason Mountain West Player of the Year pick in as many games – that’s because Emma Ronsiek and Allyson Fertig were named co-Players of the Year. In part, the individual award was split because the two players were both deserving. Ronsiek, a grad transfer from Creighton who had an illustrious career there, and Fertig, who has become a household name in the Mountain West over an extensive tenure in Laramie.

Other than being experts in their craft, the two players are starkly different, as are their teams. Ronsiek has some height, but is not the force of nature that Fertig is down low. She’s a mobile, crafty perimeter shooter and slasher leading a guard-heavy Ram team. Fertig, meanwhile is strong and assertive in the post, and draws rebounds like moths to a flame, averaging 10.4 boards per game, nearly as many as Utah State’s top two rebounders, Jamisyn Heaton (who averages 6.3) and Taliyah Logwood (who averages 4.4) combined, and well clear of Utah State's second and third leaders, Logwood and Cheyenne Stubbs (who grabs 4.2). Fertig also leads the team in scoring, but behind her is a trio of guards averaging 11 points per game: Malene Pedersen, Tess Barnes and Emily Mellema. Those four account for 52 points, and all but a small portion of the team’s total scoring. One of those four players has led the Pokes in scoring in every game so far this year.

All four have been with Wyoming for their entire careers, and have played a combined 393 games with 298 starts. The Aggies, who started two freshmen against Colorado State and regularly play four, couldn’t be more different. Last year, when Wyoming’s core was getting reps in together, Utah State’s was spread across the globe, from Maine to British Columbia, to Oakland, California. All eight of Utah State’s minutes-per-game leaders were on different teams last year. All eight of Wyoming's have only played DI basketball at Wyoming, and were on the team last year.

Players To Know

Allyson Fertig: Fertig has long been a patroller of the post in the Mountain West. She's in her fourth year with Wyoming, and having her best one yet, but she has always been a force. Last season, the 6-4 center was named to the All-Mountain West First-Team. This year, she's already making a strong campaign to keep her spot, leading the conference in scoring and rebounding while tied for third in blocked shots.

Fertig is averaging a double-double with 18.2 points, 10.3 rebounds, 1.0 assists and 1.5 blocks per contest. Her game is pretty simple: Get rebounds, block shots and score. Even still, it's incredibly difficult to create a game plan to stop her. Even when her opponents know what she is trying to do, and they often do, she just wills herself the advantage. She has only missed double-digit scoring once, and has already had three double-doubles this year. She has five 20-point games, including a 23-point performance against Creighton. She grabbed 18 rebounds, her season high against BYU. She also blocked four shots that game, the first of back-to-back four-block games, tying her season high.

Tess Barnes: Barnes is a sharpshooter who takes a lot of threes for a Wyoming offense without a ton of perimeter threats. On the conference leaderboard, she is ninth in threes made, knocking down 1.7 a game. This is her fourth year with the program, and she has improved every year, but her game really clicked last year as she broke out into a starting role. She increased her production across the board and went from averaging 4.6 points the year prior to averaging 8.9, along with 3.5 rebounds and 1.8 assists. She also improved her three-point shooting from 32.4 percent to 34.9 percent, as she went from hitting one three a game to 1.8. 

Her development has continued apace, and she has improved her performance so far this season, averaging 11.3 points, 3.8 rebounds and 2.4 assists per game while shooting 45.5 percent from the field and 33.3 percent from three. She has also cut her turnovers, from 2.2 last year to 1.6 this year, giving her a positive assist-to-turnover ratio for the first time in her career.

Emily Mellema: Mellema is the main facilitator, and adds complexity and depth to Wyoming's guard play at both ends. She can score, pass and defend, and she can even drop into the paint to grab a rebound on the off chance that Fertig didn’t already secure it. She leads the team in steals and assists, and is second in rebounds and blocks.

To call her an unsung hero might not be totally accurate, as her defensive efforts earned her a spot on the Mountain West All-Defensive team last season. However, her efforts on the other side of the court might be overlooked. The offense may run through Fertig in the post, but it has to go through Mellema first. The 5-11 guard unleashes a whole new offense that just wouldn’t be possible without her, and with two sharpshooters in Barnes and Pedersen and a conference player of the year candidate in the post, Mellema has plenty of options when leading her offense. On top of that, she is perfectly capable of creating her own shots if she can’t get the ball to her teammates.

She is averaging 11.2 points, 4.3 rebounds, 3.3 assists and 1.9 steals per game this season. Mellema is coming off back-to-back slow-scoring nights, but did everything else really well in Wyoming's most recent outings against Creighton and North Dakota. She had three points, five rebounds and five assists against Creighton, then six points, four rebounds, four assists, six steals and two blocks against North Dakota.

Malene Pedersen: Pedersen is as steady and reliable as they come. She averaged exactly 11 points in each of her first two seasons with Wyoming, and predictably, she is averaging 11.3 so far as a junior. She is also good for 3.3 rebounds and 2.5 assists per contest.

She isn’t the main option and is usually tasked with playing complementary basketball, which she does well, but when called upon, she can blow by her averages. Her season highs are 23 points, six rebounds and two steals. She and Barnes are the leading three-point shooters for the Pokes, adding valuable space for Fertig in the post.

Pedersen is a critical player in her own right, but when teamed up with Fertig Barnes and Mellema, she rounds out a powerful quartet for Wyoming that can be extremely difficult to deal with.