Game 5 • Longwood (2-2) vs Emory & Henry (2-1)
Date & Time	Friday, Nov. 16, 2026 (7 p.m.)
Location	Farmville, Va. (Joan Perry Brock Center)
Buy Tickets	Tickets
Game Notes	Longwood
Live Stats	Live Stats
Live Video	ESPN+ (T.J. Wengert and Dan McHale)
Social Media	@LongwoodLancers | @LongwoodWBB

FARMVILLE, Va. -- The Longwood women's basketball team returns to the Joan Perry Brock Center Monday to host Emory & Henry at 7 p.m., with T.J. Wengert and Dan McHale on the call.

STORYLINES
▪ Adriana Shipp-Davis returns to Farmville Monday as an assistant coach for Emory & Henry. She collected 1,050 points and 529 rebounds at Longwood from 2020-24. The 26th player in Longwood history to reach 1,000 career points and 142nd in the Big South to tally 1,000 points and 500 rebounds, Shipp-Davis was a member of the 2020-21 Big South all-freshman team, the 2023 all-Big South second team and on the 2024 preseason all-Big South first team.
▪ Longwood leads the Big South in five statistical categories through the first two weeks of the season. Those include: turnovers forced per game (29.75), turnover margin (8.5), steals per game (16.5), 3-pointers made per game (8.0) and bench points per game (36.3).
▪ London Harvey is 10th in the NCAA in offensive rebounds per game (5.5), while Nal'La Bennett is 29th in 3-pointers per game (3.0) and 33rd in total 3s made (12) through games of Nov. 14. All three figures lead the Big South.
▪ Jesstynie Scott posted nine steals against the Apprentice School in the season opener. That is tied for the third most in a single game so far this season, trailing just Coastal Carolina's Olivia Klanac with 11 and Hannah Hidalgo of Notre Dame with 10. 
▪ Longwood's 27 steals against the Apprentice School are tied with Arkansas, Portland, Northern Colorado and South Carolina State for 10th most in NCAA Division I.

LAST TIME OUT
Longwood opened with an early offensive surge and carried a five-point lead into the second quarter, but Penn used a 13-0 second-quarter run to take control and pulled away in the second half for a 72-53 victory Thursday at The Palestra.

The Lancers jumped out to a strong start behind Shakira Gresham, who opened the scoring with a pull-up jumper. Longwood built its advantage with contributions throughout the lineup, including a second-chance basket from McKenna Hoyt and a 3-pointer from stepback triple at the end of the shot clock by McKayla Hosley.

Kayla Washington added a pair of 3-pointers in the opening period, while Nal'La Bennett knocked down a 3-pointer with one minute remaining to give Longwood a 21-15 advantage. The Lancers led 21-16 after the first quarter.

Washington finished with a career-high 14 points and four of the Lancers' 10 3-pointers on the night. Gresham tallied 12 points, six rebounds and five steals. Bennett collected 11 points and three triples.

SCOUTING THE WASPS
Emory & Henry is 2-1 on teh season, including back-to-back wins against Southern Wesleyan and Belmont Abbey. The Wasps opened the season with an 80-74 loss to King before responding with a 98-48 victory over Southern Wesleyan and an 80-51 win over Belmont Abbey on Friday and Saturday at home. Emory & Henry averages 84 points per game, with five players averaging at least eight points. The Wasps are shooting 49.5 percent from the field and 37.2 percent from 3-point range.

Gracyn Hall leads Emory & Henry at 16 points per game while shooting 70.8 percent from the field and 60 percent from beyond the arc. Rhyan Harris averages 13 points and a team-best seven rebounds per game. She also leads the team with 14 assists. Paige Niethammer contributes 11.3 points, 4.7 rebounds and 3.3 assists per game. Another averaging double figures, Lyndie Ramsey has contributed 12 points per game in two outings off the bench. She is shooting 70 percent from the field and 80 percent from 3-point range.

THIRD IN BIG SOUTH POLL
Longwood was chosen to finish third in the 2026-27 Big South Women's Basketball Preseason Poll with 63 points. The Lancers sit behind High Point and Radford, which tied for the top spot with four first-place votes and 75 points each.

PRESEASON ALL-BIG SOUTH POLL
For the fourth consecutive season, the Lancers had a presence on the preseason All-Big South first team, as sophomore guard Jesstynie Scott claimed the recognition. An All-Freshman Team selection last year, Scott averaged 7.6 points, 2.8 rebounds and 1.2 assists in 17.4 minutes per game. She was named Big South Freshman of the Week four times (Nov. 10 and 17, Dec. 1 and Jan. 26) in her debut campaign.

Scott joins Amor Harris in 2025-26 and Adriana Shipp-Davis in 2024-25 and 2023-24 in recent history on the preseason all-conference first team.

NEW FACES
Longwood features a roster of no fewer than nine newcomers, including six transfers, three of whom boast previous NCAA Division I playing experience.

Nal'La Bennett, a 5-foot-6 guard from Sicklerville, N.J., played 30 games with one start as a freshman for Stony Brook of the Coastal Athletic Association last season, averaging 3.4 points, 0.7 rebounds and 0.7 assists per game for a team that finished 18-15 overall and 12-6 in the league, advancing to the league semifinals.

McKayla Hosley, a 6-foot sophomore forward and native of Columbus, Ga., appeared in six games in her freshman season at Georgia Southern.

Shakira Gresham, a 5-foot-9 junior guard from Atlanta, spent her freshman season of 2024-25, at Mississippi Valley State in the SWAC before transferring to Northwest Florida State, where she averaged 5.7 points and 1.1 rebounds in 11 games as a sophomore. With the Devilettes, she averaged 2.5 points and 1.2 rebounds per game.

FIRST TWO AGAIN
The Lancers won their first two games of the season for a second consecutive year after beating the Apprentice School, 96-27, and Virginia Union, 59-33. 

Longwood opened 2024-25 with wins over Randolph and Western Kentucky, as well. The only other group to accomplish the feat at the Division-I level was the 2005-06 Lancers, coached by Pamela Bass. That team opened 3-0, in fact, winning at American and beating Norfolk State and North Florida in the Lancer Invitational at Willett Hall.

HERE'S JOHNNY!
Rounding out the 2026-27 roster, Longwood picked up Ioana David, a 5-foot-6 graduate student guard and native of Brașov, Romania. Nicknamed "Johnny," she played in FIBA EuroBasket U20 Division B with Universitatea Cluj as a junior, averaging 7.6 points, four rebounds and 3.4 assists per game. As a senior, David averaged 10.6 points, 2.9 rebounds and 6.3 assists. 

She was called for senior national team duty with Romania that season, posting the most assists and second most steals in the Romanian National League at 5.95 assists and 2.76 steals per game.

PACKING 'EM IN
Longwood led the Big South in attendance for the second straight season, averaging 1,160 fans per game over 15 home dates. A total of 17,396 people came through the turnstiles at the Joan Perry Brock Center for the season, good for 149th most nationally.

The 2,091 fans who witnessed Longwood defeat Virginia Union, 59-33 for Homecoming & Alumni Weekend repressented the second-largest crowd in the three-plus-year history of JPB.

SCOTT STEALS IT
Longwood guard Jesstynie Scott returns for her sophomore season to lead a defensive unit that ranked seventh in the NCAA in steals per game in 2025-26, swiping 13.7. 

Individually, Scott led the Big South and finished 27th in the country with 92 total steals, which also tied for the fourth-best total in a single season at Longwood with Brenda Fettrow during the 1979-80 season. Scott also finished tops in the Big South in steals per game at 2.97, good for 18th in the NCAA, last year.

HEY, FRIEND!
Former Alabama standout and NCAA Division II head coach Betsy Harris was named an assistant coach for the Lancers in May, rounding out the 2025-26 coaching staff.

Harris most recently was the head coach at East Central Community College, an NJCAA institution in her hometown of Decatur, Miss., from 2022-24. Prior to that, she enjoyed an eight-year run with Florida Southern, won two consecutive Sunshine State Conference titles and was named league coach of the year three times, while coaching against her new boss, Erika Lang-Montgomery at Flagler. The two also played against each other in the Southeastern Conference when Lang-Montgomery was at Florida, Harris led the Crimson Tide to three straight NCAA tournaments and the 1994 Final Four as a senior.

AMBASSADOR ERIKA
Longwood head coach Erika Lang-Montgomery is one of 30 coaches and administrators part of WBCA Ambassador Program in 2026-27. 

The aim of the initiative is to unite coaches, administrators and basketball professionals nationwide who are passionate about advancing women's basketball. this season's ambassadors serve the organization as trusted voices — sharing opportunities, promoting membership and events and connecting the coaching community with the resources and programming that help it grow.

SUCCESS AT HOME
Head coach Erika Lang-Montgomery and staff helped Longwood to a 12-3 mark at the Joan Perry Brock Center in 2025-26, its best record at home at the Division I level. It was Longwood's best record at home since the 2002-03 Lancers went a perfect 14-0 under legendary coach Shirley Duncan. That team finished 27-5 overall, won the Carolinas-Virginia Athletic Conference and advanced to the second round of the Division II NCAA tournament.

The Lancers are set to play 13 games at home this season, including five in non-conference action. Among those, Longwood welcomes George Mason of the Atlantic 10 on Nov. 24 and Furman of the Southern Conference on Dec. 5.

GETTING NOTICED
Longwood received votes in the CollegeInsider.com Mid-Major Top 25 Poll in eight different weeks last season.

NINE NON-CON WINS
Longwood closed the regular-season non-league portion of its schedule at 9-4 overall for the second consecutive season. last year. The 2024-25 Lancers were 9-5 before the Big South schedule began.

SERVANT LEADER
Junior guard Lili Booker was announced as a recipient of the 2026-27 Kay Yow Servant Leader Award on Oct. 26. The full 2026-27 Servant Leader Class of upwards of 90 student-athletes across all levels of women's college basketball will be revealed by the organization in December and celebrated during a special event at the end of the season, where the fund will also name a Servant Leader of the Year. The recognition will honor one student-athlete whose impact and leadership stand out among this year's honorees.

The Kay Yow Cancer Fund was founded in honor of former NC State head coach Kay Yow, who had a 22-year battle with breast cancer before passing away in 2009. She helped set up the fund in 2007 to support advanced research, extend the quality of life for those battling cancer, serve the underserved and unite people.

As part of the fund's outreach, the Kay Yow Servant Leader Award was created in 2024 to honor student-athletes who best embody the characteristics of Coach Kay Yow – people with a servant's spirit and a commitment to selfless leadership both on and off the court and athletic field. 

Recipients of the Servant Leader Award are people of great character who put the needs of others before their own, who uplift others and who do it with grace and humility. They are nominated by their coach and are people who exemplify Yow's spirit and who reflect her resolve, grace, generosity and servant's heart.

CLUTCH IN CLASS
The Lancers earned a Women's Basketball Coaches Association Academic Top 25 Special Mention for the second consecutive season in 2025-26, the organization announced in July.

The WBCA Academic Top 25 recognizes NCAA Division I, II and III, NAIA and two-year college women's basketball teams across the nation that carry the highest combined GPAs inclusive of all student-athletes on their rosters for the entire season. The 2025-26 season was the 31st in which the WBCA has compiled the honor rolls.

Teams must have a 3.0 combined GPA to be qualified for WBCA Academic Top 25 consideration.

The Lancers posted a 3.493 cumulative GPA during the 2025-26 academic year. Eleven members of the roster carried a 3.0 or higher GPA.