Lady Eagles Begin New Year With Trip To Newberry Saturday
Jan. 2, 2009
JEFFERSON CITY, Tenn. - The Carson-Newman women's basketball team will return from a two-week hiatus Saturday afternoon when they open the new year with a road trip to South Atlantic Conference foe Newberry. Tip-off is scheduled for 2 p.m. at Eleazer Areana.
The Lady Eagles are currently 9-2 on the season, 1-0 in the conference. They defeated North Greenville 102-81 in their last outing on December 19. Newberry is 8-4 overall and 1-0 in the SAC.
"We are well ahead of where we expected to be at this point in the season," said Carson-Newman head coach Dean Walsh, whose squad was picked third in the SAC Preseason Poll.
"That said, we still have a lot of work to do if we want to be competitive in the conference. We've played a pretty tough non-conference schedule, but I think this league is as tough as it has been in quite a while."
The contest will be a matchup of contrasting styles as Carson-Newman pits the second-leading offense (84.3 ppg) in the SAC against Newberry's top-ranked scoring defense (61.8).
Walsh believes that his team must improve on the defensive end of the court in order to continue their hot start to the 2008-09 season. The Lady Eagles currently rank next to last in the league in scoring defense.
"Hopefully we learned that we have to come out and give effort night in and night out on the defensive end," Walsh said, referring to Carson-Newman's pair of losses that came in the Travel America Classic just before the holiday break. One of those defeats came against Northern Kentucky, the top ranked team in NCAA Division II.
"I know we shot poorly against Northern Kentucky, but we also learned that we can play with the best in the country," Walsh added. "We also know, however, that if we don't play with a lot of effort then we are a very average team at best."
Carson-Newman has been led in scoring by local product Ashley Kyle, who is averaging 15.1 points per game. Three other players are averaging double figures, including Shari Buford (12.5), Lindsey Eggleston (11.4) and Mandy Mendenhall (10.3). Buford is also pulling down almost eight rebounds per game.
"I think we have all the pieces to the puzzle (to be successful)," Kyle said. "We just have to put all the pieces together. We need to pick up our defense. We have to be able to stop the other team before we can beat someone (the caliber of Northern Kentucky)."
Newberry has lost its last two games after putting together a six-game winning streak that included a win over nationally ranked SAC rival Wingate. In their last outing, Newberry was routed at Georgia College and State 68-42 this past Tuesday.
Newberry also has four players averaging double figures for the season, led by sophomore guard Helen McKinney with 16.3 points per game. McKinney has already been named the SAC Player of the Week twice this year.
Radio/Audio Webcast: Saturday's doubleheader will be broadcast on WMTN-AM 1300 (Morristown). Zeke Beam will have the play-by-play call beginning with women's action at 1:45 p.m. The game can also be heard by following the Listen Live Link at www.carsonnewmaneagles.com or by visiting www.wmtnradio.com.
