The young 2006-07 Missouri State University women's basketball team will get a chance to grow up in a hurry with a challenging early-season non-conference slate at the top of a 27-game regular season schedule, announced Thursday by Missouri State Director of Athletics Bill Rowe.

Coach Katie Abrahamson-Henderson, with three NCAA Tournament appearances and one Women's NIT championship under her belt in her first four seasons at Missouri State, will send a team dominated by underclassmen into a headliner four-team tourney which features Iowa, Seton Hall and Kansas before embarking on a non-league slate including Arkansas State, Arkansas-Little Rock, Portland State, DePaul, Tulsa, Oregon and Western Illinois.

The regular season opener at Kansas City's Municipal Auditorium in the Women's Basketball Coaches Association Preseason Classic will pit Missouri State against Iowa in the Nov. 11 semifinal game while Kansas and Seton Hall will meet in the other semifinal. The third place and championship games will be Nov. 12.

Missouri State will then open its home slate with an attractive four-game run which includes Arkansas State, UALR, Portland State and DePaul. Portland State is coached by former Lady Bear Charity Shira Elliott. After a visit to Tulsa, the Lady Bears come back to Hammons Student Center to host Oregon and Western Illinois before Christmas to wrap up the non-league schedule.

The Lady Bears start their 18-game Missouri Valley Conference schedule Dec. 30 at home when they take on Southern Illinois. A New Year's Day visit to Evansville starts the 2007 portion of the slate which runs through the first weekend in March. The Lady Bears and the nine other MVC clubs then head for Des Moines, Iowa, and the State Farm MVC Tournament at Drake's Knapp Center, set for March 8-11. The tourney winner will get the league's automatic bid into the 2007 NCAA Tournament.

The MVC tourney has been good to Abrahamson-Henderson, as her teams have won the event in 2003 in Des Moines and 2004 and 2006 in Springfield. Last year's NCAA visit capped a 17-15 season which moved Missouri State to 88-40 in the first four season Abrahamson-Henderson has been at the helm.

The regular season slate will be preceded by home exhibition tests for the Lady Bears against Arkansas Tech and Pittsburg State.