Syracuse Orange fans are excited about women's basketball this year; the team is close to the top 25, and defeated a top 10 team last week. But some orange women are making strides off the court too.

SU Athletics and the ACC Network put together an all-female broadcast team for the women's basketball game next Thursday. Women will be in every lead position in the control room, and for pre-game and post-game shows.

ESPN's Beth Mowins, who graduated from SU in 1990, and former SU women's basketball student-athlete Isis Young are coming back to call the game.

Olivia Stomski, Sports Media Director at the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University, says the landscape of sports broadcasting has changed significantly since she graduated from SU in 2001.

"I didn't have any females to look up to and say, 'that person looks like me and I can do it too,'" said Stomski.

Now, she serves as a role model for all of her students.

"I don't want to be the best 'female' anything. I want to be the best professor, the best director, the best producer I can possibly be," said Stomski. "If that means I'm a role model for female students, great, if I'm a role model for male students, great."

Nicole Weaving, a senior Broadcast and Digital Journalism major at the Newhouse School, will be a part of that crew, hosting pre-game and halftime shows.

"It's rare that women really get asked to do certain sports unless you really know them," said Weaving.

She says there are challenges to being a woman in sports broadcasting.

"It's kind of figuring out how to fit your way in that's still staying true to you, and staying true to everything that you know in your practice," she said.

But working with women who are just as passionate about sports as she is reminds her that anything is possible.

"When in doubt, it's that love of sports that comes first," said Weaving. "Being able to say like 'hey I worked on the same crew as her,' is going to be a memory that I will just never forget."

Fans can get $5 discounted tickets in advance of next Thursday's game. Tickets at the Dome Box Office on game day are $10 for adults and $5 for children under 12 and senior citizens.