JEFFERSON CITY, Tenn. – No. 25 Carson-Newman (14-5, 11-4 SAC) concludes the month of January on Saturday afternoon when it welcomes Anderson (12-7, 8-5 SAC) to Holt Fieldhouse for a 2:00 p.m. affair.
The Lady Eagles are 7-1 at home this season and average 92.6 points per game. Head coach Mike Mincey's team shoots 49 percent from the field and 38 percent from beyond the arc at Holt Fieldhouse this season. C-N's average margin of victory at home this season is 27 points.
Jennifer Sullivan (Knoxville, Tenn.) was named South Atlantic Conference Player of the week on Monday, her second career weekly honor. Last week, the junior guard averaged 23.5 points, 7.5 assists, three rebounds and two steals. She scored the ball at an extremely efficient rate, making 55 percent of her field goal attempts including a 50 percent mark from three.
Scoring 20 points on Wednesday, Campbell Penland (Sevierville, Tenn.) moved up three spots on the program's all-time scoring list. The senior guard now sits in 16th place with 1,243 career points. She is 24 points behind former teammate Addison Byrd for 15th. With her next three-pointer, Penland will move into sole possession of fourth in three-pointers made in program history.
The Lady Eagles rank top ten nationally in four different categories. C-N's 19.8 assists per game is number one, while its 1.26 assist to turnover ratio is eighth-best. The skillful passing has led to the seventh-best scoring offense getting 82.8 points per game and to shoot 45.9 percent from the field, ranking 12th nationally.
This will be the 11th meeting over the last three seasons between Anderson and Carson-Newman. AU took the first meeting of the season back on November 30, 77-68. The Lady Eagles lost an 11-point halftime lead, seeing AU outscored them 49-29 in the second half. The Trojans had more third quarter points (31) than C-N's total second half total of 29. Both teams turned the basketball over 23 times, but Anderson scored nine more points off the turnovers than Carson-Newman did.
Anderson is another South Atlantic Conference team that has played really good basketball over the past two months of the season. Since handing Carson-Newman's its first loss at the end of November, AU has gone on to win nine of its next 11 games entering this matchup. The Trojans will be fresh entering the contest, having the last six days off since defeating UVA Wise 93-79 this past Saturday. During this hot stretch, Anderson has scored 80 points or more in six of those nine wins.
C-N leads the all-time series 22-15 and is 13-6 against the Trojans at Holt Fieldhouse.
The Trojans are 5-3 on the road this season and have won their last three road games. Two of those three wins came by double digits and were games where the they scored 80 points or more.
After missing the first eight games of the season, All-SAC forward Diamond McDowell is averaging a double-double since joining the lineup 11 games ago. She averages 16.4 points and 10.5 rebounds per contest. She has double-doubles in eight of her 11 games played this season. Zamiya Passmore and Rose Gravel both average in double-figures at 15 and 12, respectively, and both shoot above 50 percent from the field. Passmore is first in the conference with 88 assists.
Anderson is fifth in the country in rebounding, grabbing 45.3 boards per contest. They are top 25 nationally in both offensive and defensive rebounding. The fourth-best scoring offense in the SAC average 73 points per game.
Tipoff between the Lady Eagles and Trojans is set for 2:00 p.m. Coverage on the Eagle Sports Network begins at 1:45 with the AEC Countdown to Tipoff on MIX 105.5 (WSEV-FM, Sevierville) and online at cneagles.com/live. A video stream will be available if C-N's campus-wide Internet outage is resolved by tipoff Saturday. That can be found with a subscription to FloSports at cneagles.com/FloMbb.
