Presbyterian College at Radford
Saturday, February 7 - 2 p.m.
Dedmon Center - Radford, Va.
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PC Game Notes
RADFORD, Va. - Two days after dispatching second-place High Point, the Presbyterian College women's basketball team (12-11, 7-7 Big South) travels to Virginia to face third-place Radford (12-10, 9-4 Big South) on Saturday at 2 p.m. The Blue Hose put the brakes on a two-game losing skid with a dominating home victory over the Panthers on Thursday night, 78-59. PC will target a Radford team that has won four of its last five and nine of its last 11, including a 52-43 road win at Coastal Carolina on Thursday. PC enters the game in sixth place, one game behind fifth-place Winthrop.
PC looks to make a dent in the all-time series, trailing Radford, 4-12. The Blue Hose won two straight before the Highlanders earned a 43-35 victory in Templeton Center a month ago. Radford won the first nine meetings until PC broke through with a 52-49 win on February 18, 2012. The team won three of the next five and will aim to split the season series. The two sides also met in PC's first-ever trip to the Big South Conference tournament in 2013, with Radford coming away with the 41-38 result. Janie Miles scored a team-high 14 in this year's January meeting.
Radford rebounded from a 75-39 road loss at Liberty on Monday with a Thursday night win at Coastal Carolina. The Highlanders boast a 6-5 record overall at home and a 4-2 marker in League play at the Dedmon Center. Ayana Avery leads the team with 10.5 points per game while Jordynn Gaymon and Janayla White each add 7.4 rebounds per game. The Highlanders allow 58.1 points per game in Big South games, ranking third in that category.
Over the last five games, Keyonna Allen leads the team with 14.0 points while Allie Wagner paces PC on the boards with 5.6 rebounds per game. Aianna Kelly holds the assists lead, with 2.6 per game.
Keyonna Allen matched a career-high 22 points and set a new school Division I shooting record to power PC over High Point on Thursday night at the Templeton Center, 78-59. Allen went 10-for-11 from the floor, tying a school Division I record with 10 field goals. Her 90.9 shooting percentage set a new school D-I marker (minimum of eight) and her 22 points tie a career-high, previously set 364 days prior at Radford.
Keyonna Allen has led the team in scoring over the last six games and hit double figures in four straight until Monday. She has scored in double figures 12 times this season, leads the team with 10.3 points and ranks second with 5.8 rebounds per game. Out of 23 games, she has led the team in points 10 times, rebounds nine times, blocks nine times and steals eight times. The redshirt junior enters the week with a career shooting percentage of 49.3 percent.
The Blue Hose enter Saturday 11-3 when leading at halftime, 11-2 when outrebounding their opponent and 9-2 in the state of South Carolina. PC will look for its first win in Virginia this year, going 0-3 in the commonwealth so far.
Head coach Ronny Fisher, in his seventh season at the helm, moved into sole possession of second place in PC history last Tuesday with his 74th career victory and earned his 75th on Thursday. He passed Randy Randall (1977-84) and Byron Rucker (1984-89) with 73 wins. Beth Couture holds the record, with 238 wins amassed from 1989 to 2002.
The Blue Hose scored a combined 112 points in the paint over three straight games against Coastal Carolina (40), Longwood (32) and Charleston Southern (40) from January 10 to January 20. PC scored more than 30 only four prior times this season but set a new season-high with 42 on Thursday against High Point.
PC's Thursday win over High Point moved PC's home record to 9-1 at the Templeton Center and 6-1 in the Big South. The Blue Hose hold opponents to 31.0 percent shooting at the Templeton Center and average a rebounding margin of +8.3 The team has maintained a winning record at home in each of the last three seasons, beginning in 2011-12.
The Blue Hose boast the nation's fifth-ranked scoring defense, holding opponents to an average of 50.6 points per game. PC held Campbell to 42 points on January 27 and NC Central to 33 on December 20.
PC also ranks seventh in the country in field goal percentage defense, holding opponents to 33.8 percent. PC has held 20 of its 23 opponents to under 40 percent from the field this season after holding High Point to 38.3 percent (18-for-47) on Thursday. The team accomplished that feat 22 times last season with a 9-13 record, allowing over 40 percent only eight times. The Blue Hose also rank 11th in the country in three-point field goal defense, allowing only 25.9 percent of shots from distance.
PC returns home for its next two games, hosting Coastal Carolina in a Play 4Kay game on Tuesday at 10 p.m. before welcoming Liberty on Valentine's Day at 5 p.m.
