KINGSTON, Ont. (March 4, 2015) - The Queen's women's basketball team continues their playoff journey on Friday night as they travel to Windsor for the OUA Final Four. The seventh seeded Gaels are set to do battle with the third seed in the OUA and No. 7 ranked team in Canada Ryerson at 8pm. The other semifinal game pits the first seed and No.1 in CIS Lancers against the fifth seed and No.9 in CIS Lakehead at 6pm, both games can be seen live on OUA.tv.

Playoff Dates:
Wed Feb 25 | Laurentian 52, Queen's 80 RECAP | HIGHLIGHTS
Sat Feb 28 Queen's 85, Laurier 78 2OT RECAP | HIGHLIGHTS
Fri Mar 6 Queen's vs Ryerson 8:00pm | Hosted by Windsor | TICKETS | WEBCAST
Sat Mar 7 Queen's or Ryerson vs Lakehead or Windsor 6:00pm 

How they got here:
The Gaels enter the post-season with an 11-8 record finishing second in the OUA East division this season. In the RPI (Rating Percentage Index) rankings (found here) which determine playoff seeding based on regular season results against the other playoff teams. Queen's finished in 7th position in the rankings with a 5-8 record and 0.475 RPI. The Gaels took wins over 12th Western, 11th Carleton, 10th Laurentian and two over 8th Toronto.

Despite injuries plaguing the Gaels throughout the season they have been able to play with the best teams in the OUA losing to Laurier by only three despite leading heading into the fourth quarter and giving the Lancers all they could handle in Windsor taking a one point advantage into the fourth before dropping the decision by nine. Queen's plays a high tempo game and rank sixth in the CIS in field-goal attempts per game and free-throw attempts per game, although their free-throw percentage of 63.4 from the line is one of the lower marks in the country. Offensively the Gaels are led by Jenny Wright (Kingston, Ont.) and Liz Boag (Kingston, Ont.) who average 13.8 and 13.1 points per game respectively. On the boards Robyn Pearson (Toronto) leads the way averaging 7.9 rebounds per game (8th in OUA) while Andrea Priamo (Guelph, Ont.) follows at 5.8 for the tricolour. Others to look for on the Gaels are Abby Dixon (North Vancouver, B.C.) who has scored 10 or more points in six of her last nine games and Emily Hazlett (Fredericton) who's 45 steals this season is the 17th best total in Canada.

Queen's advanced past the opening playoff round with a convincing 80-52 win over Laurentian in Kingston on Wednesday night. Boag made her final home game in the tricolour count as she finished with 19 points to lead all scorers and added four rebounds, four assists and three steals while sinking four from beyond the arc. Second year guard Dixon paced the Gaels in the first half scoring 12 of her 16 on the night in the opening 20 minutes. Just shy of a double-double on the night was Priamo who finished with 13 points and nine rebounds in 22 minutes of action. 



The Gaels followed up with a thrilling double overtime win over the OUA second seed and No.6 in CIS Laurier Golden Hawks in Waterloo 85-78. Queen's trailed by as much as 14 early but battled back to force overtime and needing a second frame to decide a winner. The tricolour saw a strong performance from a large contingent of Gaels in the marathon match. Wright led the Gaels offence with 24 points while adding six rebounds and Pearson finished with a double-double scoring 12 and matching that with 12 rebounds. Three other Gaels were able to reach 10 or more points while Hazlett scored nine but nabbed five rebounds, four assists and four steals while going 7-10 from the charity stripe. 



The No.7 CIS ranked Ryerson Rams defeated the Ottawa Gee-Gees in their OUA quarter-final match 73-47 thanks to a 20 point and 14 rebound performance from Keneca Pingue-Giles. The Rams ended the regular season finishing in first in the East division with a 16-3 record with their only losses of the year coming against Windsor, Carleton and Toronto. The Rams also met the other semifinal participant Lakehead in a game that Ryerson won 83-75 on February 7.

Local hoopsters:
The Kingston duo of Wright and Boag will look to make one last playoff run as Boag finishes her fifth and final season at Queen's. Wright attended Regiopolis Notre-Dame high school in Kingston and was a KASSAA senior girls champion who also played with the Kingston Impact in the JUEL league. Boag played her high school hoops with La Salle SS and won two KASSAA and an EOSSAA championship while adding an OFSAA bronze. Boag also spent time learning her trade with the Kingston Impact in the JUEL league.

The duo helped lead the Gaels last season to an OUA silver and CIS Championship experience and would no doubt love to better those results this time around. The two Kingston natives were both named OUA All-Stars ahead of the Final Four, for more information click here.

Nothing new:
Much of the Gaels 2013-14 team returned this season and a long playoff run is nothing new for the Gaels. Last season Queen's took wins over Toronto and Carleton before falling in the OUA Championship to the eventual CIS Champions Windsor. At nationals the Gaels dropped two tough contests that could have gone either way early to Saskatchewan and Alberta. This year's Gaels will have to draw on that playoff experience as they would need to beat some of the top teams in the conference on the road to earn a spot at the CIS Championship in Quebec City.

Head-to-head:
2014-15
Queen's 11-8
Ryerson 16-3

Jan 24, 2015 - RYE 79, QUE 71 | RECAP
Feb. 20, 2015 - QUE 62, RYE 72 | RECAP

Last 5 years
QUE 5-8
Streak - Lost two
Last win Feb. 15, 2014 @ Ryerson 88-66

Recent playoff history
Feb 20, 2013 - QUE 86, RYE 64 | East QF
Feb 22, 2012 - RYE 71, QUE 66 | EastQF
Feb 23, 2011 - QUE 51, RYE 62 | East QF

Where they rank:
Regular season

OUA Stats	QUE	RYE		LAK	WSR
PPG	71.3 (5th)	72.8 (2nd)		71.6 (3rd)	80.5 (1st)
PPG Against	62.4 (8th)	57.1 (2nd)		59.7 (3rd)	53.2 (1st)
REB	41.7 (6th)	44.4 (1st)		39.3 (8th)	41.4 (7th)
REB Against	42.7 (15th)	37.2 (7th)		32.0 (2nd)	29.0 (1st)
AST	11.6 (9th)	14.4 (3rd)		15.4 (2nd)	16.0 (1st)
TO	16.5 (4th)	16.9 (6th)		18.2 (9th)	16.3 (2nd)
STL	11.3 (3rd)	11.7 (2nd)		10.8 (5th)	7.3 (12th)
BLK	2.1 (10th)	2.5 (8th)		1.9 (12th)	3.1 (4th)

Up Next:
The two semifinal winners will meet in the OUA Women's Championship game the following day at 6 p.m. All games will take place at the St. Denis Centre at the University of Windsor, and will be broadcast live on OUA.tv.

The OUA champion and runner-up will each receive a berth in the CIS National Championship tournament hosted by Laval University from March 12-15 in Quebec City.

Playoff Pick'Em:
Ontario University Athletics (OUA) is pleased to announce the Porter Playoff Pick 'Em Contest! 

You can win one (1) round-trip Porter Airlines flight to anywhere they fly by correctly picking the winners of the OUA Quest for the Cup Championship Weekend.
Simply choose the winners of the OUA men's and women's basketball and hockey championships and if you guess all four correct, you will be entered into a draw to win one round-trip flight voucher courtesy of Porter Airlines.

Contest closes Friday, March 6 at 5 p.m. Eastern Time, so be sure to enter now and you can be flying off with Porter Airlines to a destination of your choice! Click the image below to enter!