GREAT FALLS, Mont. – The University of Providence women's basketball cruised to an 84-67 upset victory over #22 Montana Western Saturday night.

Parker Esary scored 24 points and grabbed 12 rebounds on a perfect 11/11 shooting performance to lead the Argos to victory. Emilee Maldonado also had a big night, scoring 22 points, grabbing 7 rebounds and dishing out 4 assists. Jenna Randich added 13 points while Bailey Cartwright added 10.

"Parker was a beast tonight," head coach Bill Himmelberg said. "She's tough to beat when she plays like that. Emilee was as good as I've seen her tonight. Those two together, when they play like that and everyone else shows up, we're really hard to guard."

Himmelberg was proud of the way his girls responded Saturday after falling to Rocky Mountain College on the road on Thursday.

"I thought our girls played a full 40 minutes tonight," he said. "I thought we came out and followed the game plan. Defensively they did what we asked of them to do. They executed offensively. Every time we talked about something in a timeout or at halftime, they came out an executed it and did exactly what we wanted them to do. It was nice to see that."

Things won't get any easier for the team as they try to garner some momentum in the brutal Frontier Conference. They'll travel to Lewis-Clark State on Thursday and then Montana Tech on Saturday.

"Every win you get in the Frontier is big," Himmelberg said. "But beating the first-place team means a lot. It gives us some confidence. Now we have to be ready to go. We have to go win a couple of road games. We're more than capable of winning both. Hopefully this gives us confidence to reach the goals we set for ourselves."