photo by: Cynthia Hernandez/Journal-World

Haskell's Myona Dauphinais hoists the CAC championship tropy on Sunday, March 2, 2025, in Lawrence, Kansas.

The Haskell Indian Nations University women’s basketball team received its draw for the NAIA tournament on Thursday night, and it’s a daunting one.

The Fighting Indians will travel to face No. 1 seed Dordt in its home city of Sioux Center, Iowa for a first-round matchup on March 14 at 5 p.m. The Defenders will be defending last year’s national championship, and have gone 29-2 this season while claiming regular-season and tournament titles in the Great Plains Athletic Conference.

Dordt is led by Janie Van Donge, a senior forward averaging a double-double with 16.5 points and 10 rebounds per game, and Macy Sievers, the conference’s player of the year who stuffs the stat sheet with 15.4 points, 7.6 rebounds, 7.6 assists and 3.1 steals.

The other half of Haskell’s four-team bracket in Sioux Center includes St. Francis of Illinois and Rocky Mountain of Montana. The winners of each game will face off in a second-round matchup to be played on March 15 at 5:30 p.m.

The last time Haskell reached the national women’s basketball tournament was two years ago, when it was also a No. 16 seed and lost 84-59 to No. 1 Central Methodist on the road in Fayette, Missouri.

The Fighting Indians reached the tournament this season by beating Northern New Mexico in the Continental Athletic Conference championship on Sunday by a score of 57-52, led by 20 points from Mahpiya Irving.

Irving was one of three Haskell players selected to the CAC all-tournament team, along with Most Outstanding Player Myona Dauphinais, a junior guard who averages 16 points and three rebounds, and fellow junior Tierzah Penn with her 11 points per game.

Haskell is coached by Adam Strom, who has continued to lead the team on a voluntary basis after he was one of nearly 40 university employees terminated as part of a slew of firings of federal employees by the Trump administration. The Journal-World reported on Thursday that some of those employees were being reinstated.