ARLINGTON, Texas – The Lady Mavs' opportunity to play in the postseason and continue a historic season gets underway on Thursday night in the opening round of the WNIT, as UTA welcomes SFA to the College Park Center. Tip-off is set for 7 p.m.

WNIT | 1ST ROUND | TOURNAMENT CENTRAL
Matchup: SFA (25-6) at UTA State (23-7)
When: Thursday, March 21 | 7 p.m.
Where: College Park Center | Arlington, Texas
Live Video (ESPN+ - Ron Thulin (Play-by-Play), Mike Pedersen (Analyst) | Live Stats | Tickets

KEEP YOUR STUB…SEE UTA SOFTBALL FOR FREE
Take your WNIT 1st Round ticket stub to the UTA Softball game on Friday, March 22 (5 p.m.) and receive FREE admission!

POSTSEASON WNIT
The Women's National Invitation Tournament is an annual tournament involving 64 of the nation's top women's Division I basketball teams. All games, including the semifinals and championship, are hosted by participating schools. Every round is single elimination.

The Postseason WNIT features 32 first-round games, followed by 16 second-round games, eight third-round games, four quarterfinal games, two semifinal games, and the championship. The championship game is televised live nationally. The event offers 32 automatic berths, one to each established conference, and 32 at-large berths.

POSTSEASON WNIT HISTORY
The Postseason Women's National Invitation Tournament began in 1998 with 16 teams playing for a postseason crown. The event has undergone four expansions throughout which its mission has remained the same: To give deserving teams a quality opportunity to play exciting games for a postseason title.

Following the inaugural year, the field doubled to 32 teams and remained that way until 2006 when a renewed commitment was made to schools. The WNIT expanded to a 40-team field to give spots to teams that won their regular-season conference title but did not win their conference tournament and therefore were excluded from the NCAA Tournament.

The WNIT furthered that commitment to conferences in 2007, when it expanded to 48 teams and awarded an automatic berth to each conference. The number of at-large berths remained at 17 until 2010, when the WNIT felt that the level of women's basketball warranted an expansion to the 64-team field.

LADY MAVS IN THE WNIT
UTA is participating in the postseason WNIT for the fourth time in program history (1999, 2009, 2017).

The 2019 WNIT marks the first time in program history that the Lady Mavericks have hosted a postseason WNIT game.

The Lady Mavs are 0-3 all-time in the WNIT. UTA fell on the road at Baylor (71-60; 1999), at Oklahoma State (82-72; 2009) and at Tulane (62-53; 2017).  

1999
UTA at Baylor | L, 71-60

2009
UTA at Oklahoma State | L, 82-72

2017
UTA at Tulane | L, 62-53

UTA/SFA ALL-TIME SERIES
Thursday will be the 66^th all-time meeting between UTA and SFA. The Ladyjacks own a 46-19 edge in the series, including victories in four of the last six meetings.

KNOW YOUR OPPONENT | SFA LADYJACKS
• Seniors Imani Johnson and Chanell Hayes lead the team in scoring at 13.8 and 12.3 points per game, respectively, and are also the team's top two playmakers with 88 and 96 assists on the season.

• SFA is making its 27th appearance in a postseason tournament in program history.

• The Ladyjacks began the season as one of nine NCAA D1 programs with 1000+ program victories. Although that number now stands at 12, SFA ranks seventh in the NCAA DI ranks with 1080 victories.

• Senior Chanell Hayes continues to climb the SFA program ranks, and enters the matchup in seventh on SFA's career made three-pointers list and 29th all-time in scoring, with 1,068 points.

• With one more win this season, the Ladyjacks will set a new single-season high under head coach Mark Kellogg, with 26 total victories.

SUN BELT REGULAR SEASON CO-CHAMPS
Coach Gerlich and the Lady Mavs wrapped up the 2018-19 regular season with a 23-6 overall record (15-3 SBC). UTA, with a hard-fought 44-41 win at Texas State, earned the program's first Sun Belt regular season crown (4th overall; Southland Conference Regular-Season Titles in 2004-05, 2006-07, 2008-09).

A LIL POSTSEASON HARDWARE
Just days after securing the program's first Sun Belt regular reason title, the UTA women's basketball team saw head coach Krista Gerlich and redshirt-senior Cierra Johnson receive Sun Belt postseason accolades. Coach Gerlich was named the league's Coach of the Year for the first time, while C. Johnson was named Co-Player of the Year and earned a spot on the All-Sun Belt First Team.

Voting for the Sun Belt individual awards and All-Sun Belt teams were conducted by the league's 12 head coaches along with a selected media panel.

Little Rock's Ronjanae DeGray and C. Johnson were voted Sun Belt Co-Players of the Year. Troy's Sky'Lynn Holmes was named Sun Belt Defensive Player of the Year, Louisiana's Brandi Williams was voted Sun Belt Freshman of the Year and Georgia State's Allison Johnson was named Sun Belt Newcomer of the Year.

Coach Gerlich and the Lady Mavs wrapped up the 2018-19 regular season with a 23-6 overall record (15-3 SBC). UTA, ranked No. 25 in the latest CollegeInsider.com Mid Major Poll, earned the program's first Sun Belt regular season crown (4th overall; Southland Conference Regular-Season Titles in 2004-05, 2006-07, 2008-09) and have won 20+ games for just the 10th time in program history. The Lady Mavericks also won 11 of their last 12 games to close the regular season.

As a team, UTA finished the regular season leading the conference in scoring margin (+12.8), field goal percentage (.451), three-point field goal percentage (.378), assists (17.3) and assist-to-turnover ratio (1.2), while also ranking in the top-3 in multiple categories, including scoring, scoring defense, blocks and steals.

Johnson, the 2017 Sun Belt Defensive Player of the Year, missed the majority of last season due to a knee injury, but she returned for her final year at UTA and has started every game for the Lady Mavs and led the team in scoring (15.0), steals (58) and free-throw percentage (.829) during the regular season. C. Johnson is now UTA's leader in career steals and is ranked third all-time in Sun Belt history in steals with 308, and counting. Earlier this season she became the 19th woman in UTA history to join the 1,000-point club and now ranks 8th on UTA's all-time scoring list with 1,340 career points. The Bedford, Texas native has scored in double figures in 16 of the last 17 games (22 games total) and notched a career-high 31 points to go with a career-best 12 boards in an 88-65 win over Troy (March 2).

20+ WINS & EYEING A PROGRAM RECORD
UTA's 60-56 OT win at ULM on Saturday, Feb. 23 secured the squad's 20th win of the season and made the Lady Mavs the first Sun Belt team to hit the 20-win plateau.

The Feb. 23rd win also gave the Lady Mavericks the 10th 20-win season in program history and the 2nd of Coach Gerlich's UTA tenure.

UTA is closing in on the program record for wins in a season. The program record is 24 wins in a single season, which was achieved by the Donna Capps led Lady Mavs squad in 2006-2007 (24-9 overall).

LOOKIN' FOR 100
UTA head coach Krista Gerlich currently has a 99-81 record as the leader of the Lady Mavs program. The next Lady Maverick victory will give Coach Gerlich her 100th at UTA.

LAST TIME OUT | LADY MAVS FALL TO SOUTH ALABAMA IN SUN BELT TOURNEY SEMIFINALS (MAR. 15)
A 4th-quarter comeback which saw the #2-seeded UT Arlington women's basketball team (23-7) erase a 10-point deficit came up just short Friday afternoon as the Lady Mavs dropped their Sun Belt Tournament semifinal contest, 57-50, to #7-seeded South Alabama (24-9) inside Lakefront Arena.

Facing a 43-33 deficit early in the final quarter, UTA went on a 13-3 run over the ensuing six minutes to tie the contest at 46-46 on a Terryn Milton layup with 2:39 remaining. However, USA had a response by scoring the seven of the next eight points to build a 53-47 advantage, and the Lady Mavs were unable to get any closer than three the rest of the way.

Brooke Alexander led UTA with 12 points on 4-8 from 3-point range, while Sun Belt Co-Player of the Year Cierra Johnson closed in on a double-double with eight points and eight rebounds in 39 minutes.

FOLLOW THE LADY MAVS
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