SELINSGROVE, Pa. – For the second straight season, the Susquehanna University women's basketball team will travel to Messiah College for a Commonwealth Conference semifinal game on Wednesday, February 21 beginning at 6:00 p.m. at Brubaker Auditorium. Admission is $6 for adults, $4 for seniors and $2 for students with children under six admitted free.

For the Crusaders (15-10 overall, 6-8 Commonwealth), the road to their second straight postseason berth this season was identical to last year's journey to the playoffs. Both years, the Crusaders endured a four-game losing streak at the beginning of February to fall to 4-8 in the conference, only to win the final two regular-season games over Juniata and Lebanon Valley and earn the fourth seed via tiebreaker thanks to a season sweep of Juniata .

Senior forward Jen Clark (Elysburg, PA/Southern Columbia) leads the Crusaders in scoring (11.5 points per game), rebounding (4.6 per game) and blocked shots (21) and is second on the squad with 25 three-pointers. As a team, Susquehanna allowed a conference-low 50.2 points per game while setting a school single-season record with 139 three-pointers.

Messiah (23-2 overall, 13-1 Commonwealth) rolled to its eighth straight regular-season conference title by averaging a conference-best 69.6 points per game, and enters the week ranked fifth in the latest D3hoops.com Top 25 poll after spending two weeks ranked at number one in late January and early February.

Nikki Lobach leads the Falcons with an average of 17.2 points per game, shooting 52.8 percent (140-for-265) from the field and 78.2 percent (140-for-179) from the foul line. In two games against the Crusaders this season, Lobach averaged 18.5 points per game to account for over a third of Messiah's scoring output in the two meetings.

The Falcons have won 16 consecutive games against the Crusaders since Nov. 30, 1999 including victories this season by scores of 52-41 in Selinsgrove on Jan. 17 and 52-40 in Grantham on Feb. 7.

Susquehanna is 15-17 all-time in conference playoff games, including a 56-37 loss to the Falcons in last year's semifinals. The Crusaders' last playoff win came on Feb. 23, 1999 with an 82-71 overtime victory over DeSales (then known as Allentown College) at O.W. Houts Gymnasium.

Messiah has won or shared each of the last eight Commonwealth Conference regular-season championships and has earned postseason titles in 2002, 2003, 2005 and 2006. Since the start of the 1999-2000 season, the Falcons are 105-7 in regular-season conference games and 10-3 in playoff contests.

The winner of Wednesday night's game will advance to Saturday's championship game versus the winner of the other semifinal game between Moravian and host Albright, with the overall conference champion earning an automatic bid to the NCAA Division III playoffs.