TEAM OVERVIEWS
REGINA – After earning a bye through the first round of the playoffs, the Cougars returned to the court last weekend with a two-game sweep over UBC in the quarterfinals. Kyanna Giles drove the offence for Regina both Thursday and Friday, earning Canada West First Star of the Week honours after accumulating 48 points, 12 rebounds, eight assists, and five steals over the two games including a career-high 28-point effort in Friday's win. Sara Hubenig, Michaela Kleisinger, Charlotte Kot, and the Giles sisters - Kyanna and Kyia - made up the starting five in both games against UBC, with Carolina Goncalves, Christina McCusker, and Avery Pearce all playing key roles for the Cougars off the bench. Kot also had a solid weekend in the UBC series, totalling 31 points and 15 rebounds in the two wins. The Cougars are looking to book a ticket to their ninth Canada West championship game in 12 seasons under veteran head coach Dave Taylor.

CALGARY – Simply put, No. 4-seeded Calgary was dominant last weekend in a two-game sweep over Victoria in the Canada West quarterfinals. The Dinos rolled to a massive 105-49 win over the Vikes on Friday, then followed that up with an 80-61 win on Saturday in a game they led from wire to wire. Calgary shot the lights out from three-point land in the two wins, shooting 42.6% as a team led by Erin McIntosh and Bobbi-Jo Colburn. McIntosh was a perfect 4-for-4 from downtown in the series, while Colburn hit seven of her 11 three-point attempts. Shannon Hatch, Brianna Ghali, and Laura Grabe also hit multiple triples for the Dinos, who finished second in Canada West with 158 three-pointers made during the regular season. Calgary enters the series riding a nine-game winning streak, as the Dinos won their final seven conference games before starting out the postseason last weekend with the two wins over Victoria.

PROJECTED STARTERS

Calgary	Regina
#8 Liene Stalidzane (G • 5-8 • 1st) #10 Brianna Ghali (G • 5-11 • 5th) #11 Laura Grabe (G • 5-9 • 1st) #12 Erin McIntosh (F • 5-11 • 3rd) #22 Shannon Hatch (F • 5-10 • 5th)	#1 Charlotte Kot (F • 6-0 • 5th) #2 Michaela Kleisinger (G • 5-7 • 3rd) #6 Kyia Giles (G • 5-7 • 2nd) #7 Sara Hubenig (G • 5-9 • 5th) #9 Kyanna Giles (G • 5-7 • 2nd)

THIS YEAR
While they didn't play each other during the regular season, the Cougars and the Dinos faced each other in early October non-conference action at the Calgary Cup. Regina took that meeting by an 82-40 score, thanks to a stifling first-half effort on defence that saw the Cougars surrender just 10 points in the opening 20 minutes.
 
SERIES HISTORY
The two teams will be meeting in a best-of-three postseason series for the second time in the last three years, as the Cougars took out Calgary in two straight games back in 2016 at the CKHS to move on to the Canada West Final Four under the old playoff format. Entering the series, the Cougars have a 7-2 edge over Calgary in the postseason – four of those nine games have been played in best-of-three Canada West quarterfinal series (Regina won all four), four of them were in national tournaments (Regina won in 1991 and 2001, Calgary won in 2000 and 2012), and one was the 2013 conference championship game which the Cougars won to claim their second Canada West title. The Cougars will look to continue their home-court dominance over Calgary this weekend – in 20 games in Regina overall against the Dinos, the U of R has won 19 of them.
 
OTHER SIDE OF THE BRACKET
The top seeds also moved on to the semifinals on the other side of the bracket, as No. 2-seeded Saskatchewan took out Winnipeg in three games and No. 3-seeded Trinity Western took care of business in two straight games over Alberta. Saskatchewan and Trinity Western will meet in Saskatoon this weekend in the other best-of-three semifinal, a series that will also begin on Thursday night.

ROAD TO NATIONALS
Canada West has two automatic berths to the 2018 U SPORTS Women's Basketball Championship in addition to the host berth, which of course goes to the Cougars as the national tournament will be played at the University of Regina from March 8 to March 11. The two automatic berths will go to the two teams that advance to the conference championship game, unless one of those two teams is the Cougars – in that case, Calgary will head to the loser of the Saskatchewan/Trinity Western series next weekend to play a single third-place game, with the winner earning the second automatic berth to the U SPORTS Championship.

CALGARY CONNECTION
The U of R announced last summer that Lisa Robertson would become the Director of Sport, Community Engagement, and Athlete Development in September. Now five months into her new position, Robertson will have her loyalty tested this weekend as her former team battles the Cougars for the right to advance to the Canada West championship game. Robertson, then known as Lisa Bacigalupi, was a four-time conference all-star for the Dinos in a career that spanned from 1990 to 1995 at the U of C. While Calgary/Regina matchups are common now that both teams are in Canada West, the Dinos matched up just once against the U of R in Robertson's five seasons there – and that went the way of the Cougars, who won 70-67 in a 1991 CIAU semifinal game played in Quebec City.