RAPID CITY - The first DAC-GPAC Challenge will feature a pair of young Dakota Athletic Conference women's basketball teams trying to find their identity after seeing several key contributors leave the program from last season.

South Dakota Mines head coach Barb Felderman put together this first challenge between the two conferences as a way to give the West River teams a chance to have a tournament like the one that is being held in Sioux City, Iowa this weekend.

"There are only a couple weekends that we can play GPAC schools because they have a big conference and only have so many open dates," Felderman said. "I knew they were having a tournament in Sioux City, so I thought I would give some of the teams that weren't playing a call and see if they would come out here."

BHSU opens the tournament playing Dordt College at 1 p.m. on Friday followed by the Mines contest with Dana College at 3 p.m. The two teams will swap opponents on Saturday with action beginning at 10 a.m.

Mines enters the 2008 season without a senior on its roster and must try to find a way to make up the production left behind by the graduation of Melanie Vedvei who holds school records for steals, free throws and is second on the school's all-time scoring list.

"Everyone will probably see action this weekend," Felderman said. "The first few games are not the prettiest, but we just want to hold down the turnovers and get into an offensive flow."

The Hardrockers will be without one probable starter in Stephany Bjustrom who underwent surgery and will be out two weeks.

Black Hills State is coming off a trip to the quarterfinals of the NAIA Division II tournament, but must replace All-American Lacy Haughian and all-conference performer Snjezana Dojcinovic, who both dominated in the post.

"We need to grow as a team because we are so young and we just need the game experience to re-establish roles," BHSU head coach Mark Nore said.

There will not be a lot of familiarity with either of the opponents they will face Friday or Saturday in Goodell Gymnasium.

Both of the Greater Plains Athletic Conference schools finished in the bottom half of the conference last season but will be looking to start fast in the new season.

"I don't know a lot about Dana College other than they have a new coach which makes them harder to scout," Felderman said. "But Dordt used to be in our conference so we played them periodically. They are always tall and very athletic."