FARMVILLE, Va. -- The Longwood women's basketball team returns home to host Georgia Southern at the Joan Perry Brock Center Friday at 1 p.m., with Tommy Portela and Justin Dalton on the call on ESPN+. Fans are encouraged to bring three canned food items in exchange for a ticket. Donations benefit FACES Food Pantry of Farmville.
STORYLINES
▪ Following the postponement of Tuesday's game with Mid-Atlantic Christian, Longwood is back home to begin a three-game homestand against Georgia Southern on Friday at Joan Perry Brock Center in what is its first home game in 40 days.
▪ Today's game is the first between the Lancers and Georgia Southern in women's basketball. Longwood, though, is 34-66 (.340) all-time against teams currently part of the Sun Belt Conference. In-state foe James Madison is the Lancers' most frequent Sun Belt opponent as the two have played 65 times with LU earning 22 victories against the Dukes.
▪ Longwood's non-conference slate was set up to be a challenging one and has proven to be. The eight teams who have beaten the Lancers this season own a combined record of 49-36 (.576) on the year, as of Thursday.
▪ Longwood concluded the second-longest road trip in Division I women's basketball Sunday afternoon at William & Mary. The Lancers played seven consecutive games away from the Joan Perry Brook Center, traveling approximately 4,534 miles in that span. Middle Tennessee completed an eight-game trip from Nov. 18-Dec. 10, traversing four states and the Bahamas in 35 days, playing to a 6-2 record.
▪ Longwood head coach Erika Lang-Montgomery and Georgia Southern head coach Anita Howard have played each other six times in their Division II days at Flagler and Columbus State, respectively. The two coaches split their previous meetings with Lang-Montgomery winning once in the 2017-18 season and twice in 2018-19.
SCOUTING THE EAGLES
Winner of seven consecutive games, Georgia Southern comes into play Friday at 9-2 overall. The Eagles last played Tuesday, beating Hampton, 74-48, in the Coastal Empire Eagle Classic in Savannah, Ga.
GSU leads the country in rebounds per game, averaging 51.36, while sitting sixth in the nation in field goal percentage defense, limiting the opposition to 32.6 percent from the field. The Eagles are eighth in the country in both steals per game (13.1) and bench scoring (33.2 points per game).
Individually, Terren Ward is tied for the national lead in double-doubles with nine in 11 games. She averages 22.5 points and 10.7 rebounds per game, figures that are third and 16th, respectively, in the nation.
LAST TIME OUT
Nylah Young and Cassidy Geddes combined for 39 points and seven rebounds as William & Mary pulled away from Longwood for an 86-49 victory at Kaplan Arena on Sunday.
The Tribe, which shot 52 percent from the field, limited the Lancers to just 18 points in the second half after LU trailed 25-21 after the first quarter and 43-31 at halftime.
Adriana Shipp-Davis paced the Lancers with 12 points and a season-high three 3-pointers in her first start of the season.
NOTING THE WIN AT OHIO
Longwood's 75-72 victory at Ohio Nov. 29 was its first non-league true road win since beating Lamar, 62-59, in Beaumont, Texas, on Nov. 28, 2021.
Longwood grabbed a season-high 51 rebounds against the Bobcats, marking the most since collecting 54 against Hampton March 3, 2022, a 70-61 win in the Big South quarterfinals.
LANCERS FOURTH IN BIG SOUTH POLL
Longwood was picked fourth in the 2023-24 Big South preseason poll, announced at the conference media day in Concord, N.C., on Oct. 17.
The fourth-place tag marks the Lancers' second-highest predicted finish since joining the league for the 2012-13 season.
High Point, the Big South runner up a season ago, was chosen first with eight first-place votes and 80 total points, followed by Presbyterian and Radford in a tie for second with 61 points. The Blue Hose earned the final nod for the top spot in the poll.
TAKE ME TO YOUR LEADER
Fifth-year guard Anne-Hamilton LeRoy is among the NCAA's active career leaders in several statistical categories. Those are: games played (129, 43rd in Division I, 46th in all NCAA divisions), points (1,307, 99th in Division I, 171st in all divisions), free throws made (358, 34th in Division I) and free throws attempted (468, 37th in Division I).
OTAIFO EARNS BIG SOUTH HONOR
Freshman forward Otaifo Esenabhalu earned Big South Freshman of the Week Nov. 20 after averaging three points and 8.5 rebounds at James Madison and Clemson. She tallied career highs of 15 rebounds and three blocks against JMU.
BACK FOR MORE
Among the Lancers' four returning starters are 2023 All-South second-team selections Adriana Shipp-Davis and Anne-Hamilton LeRoy. Shipp-Davis is a preseason All-Big South first teamer this year after ranking fourth in the Big South in scoring at 13.9 points per game, while LeRoy earned a spot on the preseason second team following a season that saw her seventh in scoring (13.4).
CONTRIBUTIONS FROM THE BENCH
Longwood's non-starters are averaging 24.3 points per game, a figure that is third in the Big South and 79th overall in Division I. UNC Asheville leads the league in the category at 27.9 points per game.
Longwood outscored the opponent bench against Chowan Nov. 12 and at Stony Brook Dec. 11.
HOME, SWEET HOME
Longwood opened its home slate Nov. 12 with an 88-59 victory over NCAA Division II Chowan on Homecoming and Alumni Weekend. The game was the first in women's basketball at the new Joan Perry Brock Center, made possible by an initial $15 million gift from Brock, a 1964 alumna and philanthropist. Prior to moving next door to the JPB, the Lancers competed in Willett Hall, opened in 1980, compiling a 312-202 (.607) record in the building since the 1981-82 season.
POUTINE, PLEASE
Hailing from Montréal, Québec, freshman forward Frances Ulysse is the first player from north of the border to suit up for Longwood in its Division I history, which began in 2004-05. Ulysse averaged 15.2 points and 9.2 rebounds in 2022-23 at Vanier College, earning regional all-star honors.
Since the 2010-11 season, only eight other foreign-born student-athletes have played for the Lancers. They are: Mina Jovanovic, of Smederevska Palanka, Serbia, from 2010-12, Mieke Elkington, of Hamilton, New Zealand, from 2011-13, Jovana Vukovic, of Bar, Montenegro, in 2016-17, Rosemary Ilang, of Abuja, Nigeria, from 2017-19, Kristina Antonenko, of Moscow, Russia, from 2017-19, Milou Vennema, of Groningen, Netherlands, from 2018-23, Andrijana Reljic, of Sarajevo, Bosnia, from 2019-21 and Geassy Germano, of São Paulo, Brazil, from 2021-23.
RECORD BOOK TALK
Fifth-year guard Anne-Hamilton LeRoy, the newly minted school-record holder in career made free throws (358), is also eighth in free-throw percentage (76.5) and 11th in career points (1,307), 28 points from passing Chelsea Coward (2009-13) for 10th.
Additionally, senior guard Janay Turner turned in the seventh best single-season mark for free-throw percentage in 2022-23, hitting 83.6 (92-of-110) of her freebies in her first season in Farmville. Turner's mark ranked 69th in the NCAA a season ago.
NEXT TO 1,000?
Redshirt-senior guard Adriana Shipp-Davis comes into play needing 149 points to reach the 1,000-point milestone for her career. The 2023 Preseason All-Big South First Team honoree posted 21 double-figure scoring games, including seven with 20-plus points, last season. She has scored in double digits 38 times in her career, leading the Lancers to an 18-20 record in those games. When Shipp-Davis goes for 20 or more, which she's done eight times, Longwood has played to a 4-4 record.
Shipp-Davis turned in a career high of 26 points in a 75-65 victory over UNC Asheville on Jan. 11, 2023 while shooting 9-for-14 from the field that day.
CENTURY MARK
Fifth-year guard Anne-Hamilton LeRoy is just one made 3-pointer from 100 for her career. In 129 games and 94 starts, the Seneca, S.C., native is 99-for-331 from 3-point range, good for 29.9 percent.
SHUFFLING THE DECK
Longwood has employed four different starting lineups in 10 games so far this season. The combination of Malea Brown, Anne-Hamilton LeRoy, Janay Turner, Otaifo Esenabhalu and Laney Bone has started most often, beginning five games for the Lancers. Brown, LeRoy and Turner have each started in all 10 games while Esenabhalu has drawn eight starts, Bone six and Frances Ulysse four.
CONTROLLING THE BOARDS
Longwood has played to a 5-3 record when it outrebounds its opponent in two seasons under head coach Erika Lang-Montgomery. The Lancers are 2-1 when doing so this season with a combined plus-26 rebounding margin in their two victories.
SHIPP-DAVIS EARNS FIRST START
Redshirt-senior guard Adriana Shipp-Davis made her first start of the season Sunday at William & Mary and responded well. The Chesapeake, Va., native led the Lancers in scoring with 12 points and grabbed three rebounds in 21 minutes of action. She was 4-for-10 from the field, including going a season-best 3-for-5 from 3-point range in what was the 52nd start of her career. Shipp-Davis has scored double figures in five of 10 games this season, including three of the last four.
TURNER PROVIDES SCORING
Aside from Anne-Hamilton LeRoy and Adriana Shipp-Davis, a third starter from the 2022-23 season who averaged double figures returns to the fold in Janay Turner. A 5-foot-8 senior guard from Chicago, Turner registered 10.9 points per game, scoring double digits in 16 of 29 contests. Turner matched her then-career high of 20 points, originally set at Norfolk State in the 2021-22 season, three times for the Lancers last season.
She set a new career high in the win over Ohio Nov. 29, scoring 22 points on 6-for-13 shooting, also going a perfect 9-for-9 at the free-throw line.
TWENTY-POINT SCORERS
Senior guard Janay Turner scored a career-high 22 points on 6-for-13 shooting Nov. 29 at Ohio, including going a career-best 9-for-9 at the free-throw line. Turner also came up with a clutch steal with 7.1 seconds left to help seal the win. It marked the second 20-point performance for the Lancers this season as junior guard Malea Brown also tallied 20 in the win against Chowan on Nov. 12.
So far this season, there have been 28 games in which a player has scored at least 20 points in the Big South from 16 different individuals.
FREE THROWS WIN BALLGAMES
Longwood leads the Big South in free throws made per game at 12.6, a figure that is 129th in the nation. The Lancers also lead the league in free throw attempts (17.8), which is 132nd best in the country.
Individually, Janay Turner ranks fifth in the league in free throws made (36) and sixth free throw percentage (78.3), numbers that are 144th and 179th in the nation, respectively.
TOPS IN BIG SOUTH IN SCORING
Longwood leads the Big South in scoring average at 61.2 points per game, which is 253rd in the nation.
LANCERS SECOND IN STEALS
As a team, the Lancers rank second in the Big South in steals per game (10.7), which is 44th in the nation.
Junior guard Malea Brown is second in the league and 144th nationally in steals, averaging 2.0 per game.
TURNER FROM DOWNTOWN
On the heels of shooting a career-best 5-for-5 from 3-point range in the 88-59 win over Chowan Nov. 12, Janay Turner is shooting 42.1 percent (16-for-38) from distance.
As a team, the Lancers are second in the Big South in 3-point field goal percentage at 32 percent, good for 153rd in the country.
OTAIFO ON THE GLASS
Freshman forward Otaifo Esenabhalu has made an impact on the on the boards for the Lancers in the early going this season. The Valdosta, Ga., native leads Longwood with 5.3 rebounds per game through nine games.
Esenabhalu is one of just two players in the Big South to secure 15 or more boards in a game this season when she grabbed that many at James Madison on Nov. 15.
Marissa Gasaway of Winthrop collected 17 rebounds at South Carolina State on Nov. 17 and 16 against UNC Wilmington on Nov. 29.
