McMaster's basketball teams will make their bi-annual trip to Thunder Bay for divisional games with the Lakehead Thunderwolves on Friday and Saturday, January 29th & 30th.

Long known as one of the toughest playing environments for visiting teams,  the C-J Sanders Fieldhouse, known as "The Thunderdome",  is usually packed to capacity with partisan Lakehead fans , who heap considerable noise and verbal abuse at opposing players.

The McMaster women's team will be looking to bounce back after last week's disappointing home loss to Western, that saw the team drop to No. 8 in the CIS top-ten.  To the Marauders' credit, they have been able to rebound from each of their three OUA losses to win their next game.

The Lakehead women's team sits in fourth-place in the OUA Central division with a  4 and 5 record, but only trails Guelph by one game in the standings for a playoff spot.  McMaster leads the Central with a record of 8 and 3.  

McMaster may use the last time these two teams played as a motivating factor this weekend, as Lakehead came to Hamilton for the OUA quarter-finals last spring and demolished the Marauders 82-49, right on the floor of the Burridge Gym. 

 In fairness, it is a far different Lakehead team that will take the floor this year, as graduation hit the Thunderwolves hard.   Lakehead's top shooter this year is guard Bridget O'Reilly, who is the team's only double-digit scorer at 12.6-PPG.  Post players Gillian Lavoie (6.9-RPG) and Katelyn Andrea (7.8-RPG)are both solid and rebound very well.

As a team McMaster will look to shake off a subpar shooting performance (35% FG)  versus Western, and eliminate the turnovers that proved costly in the loss to the Mustangs.  Game time both nights is at 6-pm
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For the Marauder men, this weekend's games have taken on added significance as Lakehead (4 & 5) is now ahead of Guelph (4 & 6) for the final Central Division playoff spot, which means the OUA RPI will be impacted by the weekend results.  At  9 and 2, McMaster is tied with Brock for first-place in the OUA Central.

The Thunderwolves are led by guard Henry Tan (16.8-PPG) and forward Bacarius Dinkins (15.3-PPG), with veteran guards Alex Robichaud (8.9-PPG) and Nick Burke (8.1-PPG) providing solid support. 

The McMaster men are riding an eight-game win streak and will be trying to keep up the momentum, before heading into the team's bye-week and then preparing for crucial games in February.  A key to success at Lakehead will be the Marauders' ability to ignore the outside distractions and keep their focus on their opponent.

Tip-off both nights is set for 8-pm.

All four Marauder games from Thunder Bay will be available to McMaster fans on radio on CFMU-FM 93.3 FM and streamed on the internet on OUA.tv