Atlantic Sun Weekly Release |
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Sat., March 1
Fort Myers, Fla. – Alico Arena (4,633)
NKU (15-11 overall, 11-4 A-Sun) vs. Florida Gulf Coast (21-7 overall, 15-1 A-Sun)
Series Record: FGCU leads 2-1
Last Meeting: NKU 63, FGCU 43 (Feb. 1, 2014)
HIGHLAND HEIGHTS, Ky. – The Northern Kentucky University women's basketball team returns to the road for its last regular season away contest on Saturday night in Fort Myers, Fla., as the Norse take on Florida Gulf Coast in Alico Arena in Atlantic Sun Conference action at 7 :05 p.m.
NKU is 15-11 overall and 11-4 in the Atlantic Sun Conference after falling to Stetson, 74-57, in DeLand, Fla., on Thursday evening.
Melody Doss led the way for NKU with 15 points, and she went 3-for-5 from behind the 3-point arc.
Kayla Thacker finished with 12 points and grabbed seven rebounds, while
Kaitlyn Gerrety added 10 points and a team-high eight rebounds.
FGCU, which has clinched a first round home game in the Atlantic Sun Championship, enters the contest 21-7 on the year and 15-1 in the Atlantic Sun after defeating Lipscomb, 108-67, on Thursday. The Eagles' total set the mark for their highest point output as an NCAA Division I member. FGCU placed seven players in double figures on the night, led by Kaneisha Atwater's 16 points. Whitney Knight added 15 points on the night, while Sarah Hansen, the reigning Atlantic Sun Player of the week, scored 13 points and grabbed 10 rebounds for FGCU.
Hansen, the conference preseason player of the year, leads FGCU by averaging 14.0 points and 7.1 rebounds per game. Knight follows with a 12.4 scoring average, and she has blocked 77 shots on the year, which lands third among Atlantic Sun players. Stephanie Haas averages 11.5 points per contest, while DyTiesha Dunson leads the Eagles with 81 assists on the season for an average of 3.1 per game to rank sixth in the conference.
As a team, FGCU is among the top of the Atlantic Sun in several categories. The Eagles are limiting their opponents to an average of 59.5 points per game, which leads the conference as does their 3-point shooting as FGCU has connected on 34.7 percent of their attempts from behind the arc. The Eagles are scoring 69.8 points per game, and they are shooting 41.3 percent from the floor to rank second in both categories.
Links to live stats, the ESPN3 broadcast and Andrew Kappes' audio broadcast will be available at nkunorse.com.
LAST TIME AGAINST FLORIDA GULF COAST: NKU handed FGCU its first regular-season Atlantic Sun Conference loss since the 2010-11 season with a 63-43 victory on Feb. 1 at The Bank of Kentucky Center.
Kayla Thacker scored 16 of her game-high 22 points in the first half to lead NKU past FGCU, which had not suffered a conference setback since falling to South Carolina Upstate on Feb. 28, 2011, and saw its 44-game streak snapped.
The senior guard from Mt. Washington, Ky., finished 8-for-10 from the floor, including a perfect 6-for-6 in the opening 20 minutes, and 4-for-5 from behind the 3-point arc. She also grabbed a game-high nine rebounds as the Norse won the battle on the boards by a 36-23 margin.
The first half was a story of runs. Thacker scored the first seven NKU points, and the Norse used a 7-0 spurt to take a 9-4 lead with 14:37 left before the break. FGCU later took advantage of a 12-0 run to regain the lead at 21-13 with 7:19 left in the half, capped by a layup by Katie Meador, which was the largest deficit of the game for the Norse.
NKU, however, closed the half with a 19-0 run to take a 32-21 advantage into halftime as the defense held FGCU scoreless after the Meador layup.
The Norse shot 52.2 percent from the field in the first half while limiting the Eagles to just 32 percent. The NKU defense forced three shot clock violations and took advantage of 10 Eagle turnovers in the opening stanza to build its halftime lead.
Thacker drained a 3-pointer and
Kelley Wiegman converted a layup to open the second half to stretch the Norse advantage to 37-21 before FGCU ended its scoring drought on two free throws by Sarah Hansen with 18:17 left on the clock.
The Norse defense did not back down in the second half, and back-to-back 3-point field goals by
Christine Roush and
Lauren White gave NKU its largest lead of the game at 55-33 with 7:17 remaining in the game before cruising to the win.
The Norse finished the night 48.9 percent from the floor after going 11-for-24 in the second half and shot 50 percent (9-for-18) from long range. NKU forced 21 FGCU turnovers and scored 19 points off those miscues as the Norse held the Eagles to their lowest point total in their program history.
Wiegman finished with 12 points on 5-for-9 shooting from the floor for the Norse, while
Kaitlyn Gerrety added six points and eight rebounds. White scored seven points and dished out a career-high seven assists against FGCU, which held a 2-0 advantage in the all-time series against the Norse entering the game.
Whitney Knight led the way for the Eagles with 19 points and four blocked shots. Meador finished with eight points and five rebounds on the night, while Hansen, who entered the contest averaging 13.7 points and 6.8 rebounds per game, was limited to just six points and four rebounds.
STEADY IMPROVEMENTS: Since scoring a career-high 17 points at Mercer on Feb. 6,
Kaitlyn Gerrety has raised her scoring average to 4.5 points per game and is now pulling down 4.3 rebounds per contest. The junior from Cincinnati, Ohio, added 10 points on 5-for-9 shooting from the field and grabbed eight rebounds against Stetson for the Norse on Thursday night.
She entered the Mercer game averaging 3.9 points per game and has since eclipsed that average in six straight games, capped by her 10-point performance on Thursday, after contributing 8.3 points and 5.5 rebounds per game during that time span. Gerrety has pulled down more than five rebounds in each of NKU's last three games.
WIEGMAN DISHES: Kelley Wiegman finds herself among the top 10 in the Atlantic Sun in assists. She is averaging 3.1 assists per game for a total of 46 on the year against conference opponents, which ranks seventh in the Atlantic Sun. On the year, the freshman guard from Cincinnati, Ohio, has dished out 65 assists for a 2.5 average to rank 10th in the conference.
In her first season with the Norse, Wiegman is contributing 7.3 points and 3.3 rebounds per game. She has scored in double figures seven times, including a career-high 19 against Jacksonville on Feb. 15. She leads the team in assists (65), steals (33), free-throws attempted (105) and free-throws made (76).
LEADING UPPERCLASSMEN: On Thursday night, NKU's upperclassmen combined to score 37 of the team's 57 points against Stetson, which equates to 64.9 percent of the offense on the night. Junior
Melody Doss led the Norse with 15 points, and she finished 3-for-5 from behind the 3-point arc. NKU's lone senior
Kayla Thacker added 12 points and seven rebounds, while
Kaitlyn Gerrety finished with 10 points and a team-high eight rebounds for the Norse.
On the year, the trio is contributing almost half of NKU's total points. Doss is averaging 14.9 points per game, while Thacker follows with a 12.6 scoring average. Gerrety adds 4.9 of the team's 64.9 points per game.
Doss, Thacker and Gerrety are also adding more than half of the Norse's rebounding production as well. Thacker leads the team with a 6.8 rebounding average, while Doss is pulling down 6.7 rebounds and Gerrety is grabbing 4.3 boards per game.
FEBRUARY'S MARK: NKU finished the month of February with 5-2 record following its loss to Stetson on Thursday. The Norse began the month the same way they will begin March by facing FGCU. NKU defeated the Eagles, 63-43, on Feb. 1 and earned victories over Mercer (72-64), North Florida (78-65), Jacksonville (69-61) and Lipscomb (61-57).
The two Norse defeats came from Kennesaw State (53-39) on Feb. 8 and Stetson (74-57) on Thursday night.
Since the start of the new year, NKU is 11-4 over January and February after starting the season 4-7 in November and December.
SUCCESS AT NIGHT: NKU is 11-6 this season when starting games at 5 p.m. or later. All but one of the Norse's home games have started at 7 p.m. this year, and NKU has defeated Cincinnati (Nov. 9), Illinois State (Nov. 13), Mercer (Jan. 9), Kennesaw State (Jan. 11), Lipscomb (Jan. 25), Florida Gulf Coast (Feb. 1), North Florida (Feb. 13) and Jacksonville (Feb. 15) at The Bank of Kentucky Center in contests that started at 7 p.m.
The Norse have earned night road victories against South Carolina Upstate (Jan. 2), North Florida (Jan. 16), Mercer (Feb. 6) and Lipscomb (Feb. 22) in games with 5 p.m. Eastern start times or later.
LOOKING FOR 16: With three games to go in the season, the Norse need just one more win to eclipse the total victories NKU achieved during its 2012-13 season and set a new benchmark in its NCAA Division I transition. The Norse finished their inaugural year competing at the NCAA Division I level last season with a 15-13 overall record.
