JACKSONVILLE, Ala. – Despite mounting a big comeback in the third quarter that saw the Georgia Southern women's basketball team pull to within three of Jacksonville State, the Eagles fell 67-55 on the road inside Pete Mathews Coliseum. Senior Patrice Butler dominated down low as she recorded her fifth career double-double off 19 points and 11 rebounds.

For the game, the Eagles shot 32.2% (19-59) from the field, but they were hampered by 26.5% (4-15) shooting in the first and second quarters and 27.3% (3-11) in the fourth. GS was able to shoot 44.4% (8-18) in the third period as the Eagles out-scored JSU 21-16.

Butler highlighted three players finishing with double-digit points for head coach Kip Drown and Georgia Southern. Butler led all players in both scoring and rebounding. Angel McGowan scored 13 points and Sierra Butler ended the afternoon with 10. Alexis Sams had four assists, five rebounds and two steals.

Jacksonville State started off hot, shooting 58.8% (10-17) in the first quarter, before ending the game 41.8% (28-67) from the field. A 26.7% (4-15) second quarter slowed the Gamecocks momentarily, but they bounced back in the third and fourth.

Similar to the Eagles, three Gamecocks scored in double figures led by Rayven Pearson's 15 points. She went an impressive 7-for-8 (87.5%) from the field while Briana Benson hit four three-pointers, a game-high, en route to scoring 14 points. Lacey Buchanon ended her 31 minutes of action with 11 points.

THE STORY
The Gamecocks started the game off hot with a 7-0- run before Patrice Butler was able to get the Eagles on the board with a layup at the 7:32 mark of the first quarter. Butler scored Georgia Southern's first six points before Sams hit a three-pointer, pulling the Eagles within three at the time.

The second quarter saw much of the same as JSU pushed the tempo of the game and capitalized on some Georgia Southern miscues to take an eight-point, 32-24 lead into the locker room at halftime. But the Eagles came back out in the third quarter and slowly chipped away at the Gamecock lead. With 1:19 left in the period, McGowan gave the Eagles their first lead of the afternoon with a layup, but Buchanon matched her with a layup and then hit a close to half court shot at the buzzer to give JSU a three-point lead heading into the fourth quarter.

Using the momentum of that buzzer-beater, JSU rebuilt the lead out to as many as 18 during the fourth before settling for the 12-point, 67-55 final.

QUOTE FROM COACH KIP DROWN
"I thought our kids battled even though we got down right from the start. We got back into it and then they made another run there in the second quarter and we were once again able to get back into it at the start of the second half. They made a few really good shots, particularly that half-court shot at the end of the third when the game was tied, and Benson hit a couple threes down the stretch. But I felt like we got better as a team on a few things. We had a few things coming out of our last game at Clemson that we wanted to improve on and I felt like we did that today. I felt like we matured in several areas, particularly offensively. So, I'm going to take some positives from this, but one of the things we were disappointed in was we didn't rebound the ball offensively as well as we had hoped we would, we had some players standing on the perimeter too much. We just have to get on the offensive glass better because you're going to miss shots, that's just part of the game, so we have to have teammates there that are under the basket giving us second and third looks.

NOTES
- Georgia Southern is now 5-6 against Jacksonville State, including 1-1 in the Kip Drown era and 0-5 in Jacksonville, Ala.
- Senior Patrice Butler's 19 points and 11 rebounds gave the Norcross, Ga., native her fifth double-double of her career at Georgia Southern.
- Head coach Kip Drown is now 472-350 all-time and 8-24 at Georgia Southern.

NEXT UP
Georgia Southern will continue its current stretch of four straight road games by traveling to Tuscaloosa for a game on the SEC Network+ against the Crimson Tide of Alabama on Tuesday, Nov. 22. The game will tipoff at 8 p.m EST.


Georgia Southern Athletics provides up-to-date information on all its sports through its official website, GSEagles.com, through social media channels facebook.com/GSAthletics, twitter.com/GSAthletics, iOS app Georgia Southern Eagles and Android app Eagles GATA. Fans can purchase tickets to Georgia Southern Athletics events by visiting GSEagles.com/Tickets.