HARTSVILLE, S.C. – After overcoming its second double-digit halftime deficit of the year, Carson-Newman makes the 307-mile journey to Coker to close out the South Atlantic Conference regular season on Saturday at 2 p.m. in the DeLoach Center.
"It's a lesson learned," Carson-Newman coach Mike Mincey said. "We have to go over there and get on it early to make sure we don't have to try to come back from a double-digit deficit in the second half on the road."
In terms of seeding for the 2022 SAC Women's Basketball Championship, the Lady Eagles can be no worse than the No. 3 seed. With a Catawba loss at UVA Wise, C-N would move to second or win a three-team tiebreaker should those two and Anderson be in a three-way tie to be the No. 2 seed.
Carson-Newman (22-5, 19-4) has taken over the nation's lead for assists in a game posting 18.9 on average per evening bumping that to 26 in the last four. Overall, the club has recorded 13 games out of 27 with at least 20 assists with five of at least 25. Three players rank in the top 14 of the league in the category.
Saturday marks the 18th meeting between the Lady Eagles and Coker (6-19, 5-18) as Mincey's crew has a commanding 15-2 lead with wins in each of the last 12 outings. The average differential in that span has been just south of 30 points per game with a trio of 100-point efforts and nine with at least 80. However the team has had to grind out a couple wins in Hartsville including coming back from down 14 in the second half to win 71-66 on Feb. 15, 2021. Coker's last win over the Lady Eagles came on Jan. 17, 2015 in Hartsville, a 68-61 win.
In the first meeting this year, the Orange and Blue shot at least 60 percent in three of the four quarters and shot 55 percent for the game to win 93-65 at Holt Fieldhouse on Jan. 17. Five Lady Eagles finished in double figures led by 22 points from Braelyn Wykle (Greeneville, Tenn.). The post tandem of Lindsey Taylor (Maryville, Tenn.) and Sydney Pearce (Johnson City, Tenn.) combined for 37 points making 16 of 22 field-goal attempts.
It was a good start to the year for the Cobras winning two of the first three outings of the year including a 22-point over a Francis Marion team that had beaten first-place Wingate the day before. However the club has won just four times in the last 22 affairs including nine of the last 11. Each of the team's two losses this week have come by six points after it had rattled off back-to-back wins.
Offense has been the team's biggest struggle ranking 12th in scoring offense (58) and field-goal percentage (36.1) shooting the second-fewest foul shots in the league and ranking last in free-throw percentage with a 63 percent clip. The Cobras have failed to score 70 points 20 times winning just one of those games compared a 5-0 mark when they get to the 70-point marker.
Coker's biggest strength this year has been on the glass where it ranks fifth in the league in rebounding snatching down 39 per game and outrebounding clubs by two. It is snaring a dozen offensive caroms a night with double digits in seven of the last eight.
Saquita Joyner is the team's lone double-digit scorer but was held to nine points on 3-for-12 shooting in the first meeting. She has been in double figures 18 times including each of the last eight affairs racking up 14 points per game in that stretch. She also has six games with at least 10 rebounds ranking 10th in the conference in the category.
Broadcast coverage airs on the Eagle Sports Network starting at 1:45 for "The Appalachian Electric Cooperative Countdown to Tip-Off" on Mountain Sports 106.3 (WPFT-FM, Sevierville) with an audio stream available on cneagles.com/live free of charge.
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