Despite Lauren Fech scoring a career-high 27 points in the last game against Wayne State College, Winona State still lost 60 – 56 points. With this game, Winona State had their third losing strike, and all of them were at home. Winona State University players are showing their individual skills but lacking some team effort which is causing them some easy wins.

Winona State lost their last three home games against Minnesota State University Moorhead with 66 – 54 points, Augustana University with 79 – 71 and Wayne State College on Feb. 4. In these three games, Lauren Fech was either the highest in points, or she had the highest number of rebounds.

Even after losing against Augustana University on Feb. 3, 2023, Winona State was quite confident about facing Wayne State College. Fech said, “I think tomorrow we just got to calm locked in focused. Wayne’s definitely a winnable game for us. So we just got to come and bring that same energy tomorrow.”

In the game on Friday, the Warriors were 28 of 64 (43.8%) overall from the floor and hit 7 of 26 (26.9%) from behind the arc and were 8 of 13 (61.5%) at the foul line, while the Vikings were 11 of 13 (84.6%) on free throws. Augustana held a 36 – 31 edge in rebounds, while the Warrior bench outscored the Viking reserves, 17 – 12.

With the loss against Augustana, Winona State falls to 10 – 13 overall and 4 – 13 in the NSIC which still kept them in the fight as they had a good record against Wayne State at home.

Winona State head coach, Ana Wurtz, was also confident about the game against Wayne State after knowing about the ugly traps they can put up.

“Wayne tries to ugly up the game a bit, kind of send some random traps and it’s just a different look that we’re not used to seeing every night which is why it fares well for them at times, because people just aren’t, it’s tough to replicate in a practice,” Wurtz said. 

Wurtz gave us a new piece of information behind their success. She emphasized the scout team by saying, “We certainly did our best, we’ve got a great group of scout team players that help us get ready for a game like that. So, I think we’ve seen what we can see.”

Things did not go according to the Warriors’ thought as Wayne State knocked down 3 of 4 free throws in just under four minutes of play to take a narrow lead over Winona State after the fourth quarter. Though Winona State owned a 29 – 23 advantage at the break, Wayne State found a way back into the game and tied the contest at 52 – 52 in the fourth quarter.

Fech tried her best to keep the game on the side of Winona State. She was 9 of 14 overall from the floor and 4 of 7 from the three-point territory which cleared a route to one of the best Winona State offensive performances of the season and of her career.

Fech gave the credit for her success to her teammates and her coach in an interview as she said, “My teammates set me up in great positions and obviously our coaches, you know, played to our strengths.”

Wayne State was led by Lauren Zacharias with 17 points and Kylah Vandonkersgoed who also hit double digits with 11 points in the game. They did not have one big performer, but their team effort was up to the mark.

With three losses, Winona State falls to 10 – 14 overall and 4 – 14 in the NSIC. They are now in position 7 in the south zone with 0.222 Certified Professional Collector Trainer (CPCT). They will have their next three games away and after that one at home.

On February 10, they will face the University of Sioux Falls (S.D.). This one might be a slightly easy one for them as the Warriors have a win against them in their last game and they are now below Winona State in the rankings of NSIC.

On February 11 and on February 16 respectively, Winona State will face Southwest Minnesota State University and Minnesota State University – Mankato. They are some of the top-ranked teams in the NSIC, which will make it hard for Winona State to finish the season in a smooth manner.