The Simpson Storm women’s basketball team upset #7 Wartburg on their home court Wednesday night with a 66-62 win, with the Storm men starting slow but picking up the pace late and won 71-65 in a pair of games heard live on KNIAKRLS.com. The Storm women started off strong, building up a lead early as high as 13 points before Wartburg came roaring back cutting the lead to four at halftime where the Storm held a 32-28 advantage. The Storm built another 13 point lead in the second half, just to see the first half play out again with Wartburg coming all the way back to tie the score and take a late lead, but continuous clutch shots from the Storm gave them a late lead and eventually the win. Cassie Chubb hit five three’s and scored 17 to lead the Storm, and the Storm as a team outrebounded the Knights 45-36. Assistant coach Moran Lonning tells KNIA Sports the strong defensive performance put on by the Storm had a lot to do with their effort and intensity.

“They shoot even more three’s than us, which is crazy. So we really talked about being there on the catch with the shooters, and containing the drive so they couldn’t get easy kick out three’s. But our intensity and hustle is something that we can control and that is something that we wanted to focus on.”

The Storm men got off to a dreadful start in the first half against Wartburg, trailing 43-31 and didn’t have much go well. An 18-4 run to start the second half however brought the Storm right back into the game. Wartburg and Simpson traded the lead back and forth throughout the final 10 minutes, but Conor Riordan hit a jumper to put the Storm up two points late, then a steal from Nick Janssen and a layup from Ahmed Musa sealed the victory. Kyle Wagner led the squad with 20 points. The Storm women have now won 10 in a row to improve their record to 14-3 overall and 6-2 in American Rivers Conference play, while the men are 9-8 and 3-5. Both squads will next play Saturday at Dubuque.