LAS CRUCES, N.M. – The Aggies will arrive back at the Pan American Center one final time to wrap up the conference regular season. NM State will look to split against LA Tech as they host the Lady Techsters on Thursday and secure the CUSA 4th place seeding in the conference tournament next week.
HOW TO FOLLOW
Who: NM State (15-13, 8-7 CUSA) vs LA Tech (14-13, 7-9 CUSA)
Where: Pan American Center – Las Cruces, NM
When: Thursday, March 6, 2025, at 6:00 p.m. MST
Live Stream: ESPN+
Live Statistics: StatBroadcast
All-Time Series Record: LA Tech leads 7-16
Last Meeting: NMSU lost 67-58 (January 4, 2025)
LAST TIME AGAINST LA TECH
With two made threes on two attempts, Sianny Sanchez-Oliver set a new career high in threes made. This was also just the second time this season that an Aggie has finished perfect from beyond the arc while tallying two or more attempts.
Kaiser tied her season high in made free throws in a game at the stripe with nine sunk in - a mark she has now reached six times this season.
NM State finished with their second-lowest field goal percentage of the season at 34% (15-19) and outrebounded LA Tech 35-30.
THE PRODIGY
Molly Kaiser has spent all five seasons with the Crimson & White, making her the longest-tenured Aggie on the 2024-25 roster. The Watauga, Texas, native has 1,810 points across her career and has moved into third all-time in scoring for the Aggies in program history. Scoring over 1,800 points, she's also currently the active leader in career points among CUSA players. She now sits just 121 points shy of moving into second on the Aggies all-time scoring list.
Last month, Kaiser was named Conference USA Player of the Week for the fourth time this season after dropping 31 points against Liberty. This marked the fourth CUSA weekly award for Kaiser, which equals the most by an Aggie in program history. This season, Kaiser has also hauled in two NCAA Starting Five accolades, which recognizes the nation's top five performers each week.
Kaiser sits at 18th in the nation in points per game (20.3) and 15th in total points (588). Including her 30-point outing against UTEP three weeks ago, Kaiser is also responsible for the five of the eight highest scoring performances in league play this season.
FANTA-STIC
Fanta Gassama's eight double-doubles thus far marks the first time that an Aggie has recorded five or more double-doubles in a single season since Bigue Sarr tallied 12 double-doubles in the 2021-22 season.
Fanta tallied her second highest game in rebounds this season, snagging down 14 against the Gamecocks.
She currently sits at 19th in the nation and second in CUSA in defensive rebounds per game (7.3).
D-UP
At the moment, NM State ranks third in the conference in steals per game (9.81), which has led their opponents into 557 total turnovers. This has carried over in league play as the Aggies currently rank second in turnovers forced per game (19.2) against CUSA opponents.
FROM DOWNTOWN
Entering Thursday, the Aggies rank third in 3-point percentage in CUSA play, shooting 30.4%. This mark is led by Jaila Harding who is currently shooting an impressive 42.3% from the perimeter against league opponents.
Two weeks ago against the Panthers, the Aggies went 8-20 (40%) from beyond the arc which marked their best 3-point percentage since January 11th when they shot 42.1% against UTEP.
FRESH FISH
Madi Gewirtz picked up her second Conference USA Freshman of the Week award this past week. Previously, Madi Gewirtz became the first and only player in Aggie program history to earn the honor. Three weeks ago, she scored 17 points over Western Kentucky and picked up four defensive boards along with two assists to serve as a catalyst in the Aggies' win over the Hilltoppers.
VETERAN LEADERSHIP
The Aggies are led by 11 upperclassmen, including nine seniors. Molly Kaiser and Diarrah Sissoko are each in their fifth season of collegiate basketball, headlining a 15-person roster that has 50 combined seasons of experience, including 32 at NM State. Four Aggies are on at least their third season in the program: Molly Kaiser (five), Sylena Peterson (four), Sianny Sanchez-Oliver (four) and Lucía Yenes (three).
INTERNATIONAL AGGIES
There are seven Aggies with international backgrounds on the 2024-25 roster. Four of those seven hail from Spain (Fanta Gassama, Noah Garcia, Marta Guilera, Lucía Yenes). Hungary (Anna Csenyi), Netherlands (Loes Rozing) and Mali (Diarrah Sissoko) are also represented on this year's squad. Four of six Aggie newcomers are from overseas. 593 of the Aggies' 1,872 points this season have come courtesy of international members, accounting for over 32.3% of the team's production thus far.
GUESS WHO'S BACK… BACK AGAIN
Nearly every rotational guard and wing has returned in action in 2024-25, with 75.66% of the 2023-24 point production still on the roster. Additionally, the returning Aggies accounted for 85.14% of all assists and 97.71% of 3-pointers made (128 of 131) a season ago.
ONE LAST RIDE
This iteration of the Aggies revolves around fifth-year legend Molly Kaiser. The Watauga, Texas, native exercised her extra year of eligibility that she earned from the NCAA's response to COVID-19, electing to spend her fifth and final campaign with the Crimson & White. In 2023-24, Kaiser led the Aggies in games played (31), games started (31), points (463), points per game (14.9), minutes per game (34.2), field goals made (165), free throws made (107) and free-throw percentage (86.3).
Last season, Kaiser drove and buried a patented elbow jumper shot to give her 1,000 career points, with every bucket coming as a member of the Crimson & White. She became the 25th member of the 1,000-point club, and the first since Gia Pack, who played for the Aggies from 2016-2020.
LAST TIME OUT...
For the first time this season, the Aggies' scoring offense was led by Lucia Yenes, who finished with 16 points against WKU. She also led the team defensively as she picked off a season high of five steals along with six defensive boards. Yenes and Harding combined for 31 total points in today's matchup, which was almost half of NM State's total.
The Aggies also scored a whopping 31 points in the final quarter. This is the most the Aggies have scored in a single quarter this season.
Four separate players scored above 50% on FGs including Yenes (8-for-12), Sylena Peterson(3-for-5), Imani Warren (3-for-4), and Fanta Gassama (3-for-3) to comine for 39 of the 68 Aggie points.
Finally, the Aggies picked off 6 more steals and had two less turnovers than the Lady Hilltoppers.
SCOUTING LA TECH
Brooke Stoehr leads the Bulldogs as she enters her fifth season as head coach. In her last few seasons with the team, Stoehr surpassed the 200-win milestone with a road win at Jacksonville State during the 2023-24 season and topped 100 wins at Tech in a CUSA tournament semifinal win over UAB in March of 2022. Stoehr now sits third all-time in program wins behind Leon Barmore and Sonja Hogg after the 2022-23 season with an overall record of 191-150, including a 120-91 mark in Ruston..
During the 2021-22 season, Stoehr led the squad to a 21-12 record, winning the Conference USA West Division crown and earning an automatic birth in the WNIT. The Bulldogs also reached the CUSA finals for the first time since joining the conference after beating UAB and completing an 11-point fourth-quarter comeback over Middle Tennessee in the tournament semifinals.
The leading scorer for this team is their outstanding Freshman, Paris Bradley, who currently averages 13.9 points per game. She also leads the team in FG percentage, assists, and steals.
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