The University of Minnesota Duluth women’s basketball gears up for their 2025 home opener against St. Cloud State.

After splitting their year-opening matchups, losing 73-43 to Northern State University and winning 74-50 against Minnesota State University Moorhead.

UMD women’s basketball head coach Mandy Pearson noted the difficulty of the Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference, and being unable to rely on the momentum of a previous win. But with a single game weekend compared to their usual double-header weekends, the team can focus more on themselves over their opponents.

“Sometimes when you’re playing two opponents, you get, well, we do anyways. We spend so much time preparing for both games that we forget to work on us. And we’ve been able to work on some things and work out some kinks with a few things within our offense and defense that hopefully are going to make us a lot better this week,” said Pearson.

UMD will tip off against St. Cloud at the Romano Gym at 1PM on Saturday. Click here to view their full season schedule.

Saturday’s matchup is also dedicated to Sophie’s Squad, an organization focused on mental health awareness and founded by UMD women’s hockey alumni Gabbie Hughes.