Lady Eagles Beat Furman, Remain Perfect at Home

STATESBORO, Ga. – Tiffany Brown’s 1,000^th-career point and Shawnda Atwood’s double-double performance highlighted Georgia Southern’s 59-53 victory over Furman, Monday evening (Jan. 14), at Hanner Fieldhouse, extending the team’s perfect home record to six games.

Coming into the game, Brown (Waxhaw, N.C.) was one point shy of eclipsing the career milestone. She tallied the record mark on a free throw with 11:14 on the clock in the first half. The senior guard joins 16 other Lady Eagles to have accomplished such a feat.

The Lady Eagles improve to 9-8 overall and 5-1 in Southern Conference play. Georgia Southern maintains its second-place mark in the conference, sharing the spot with College of Charleston, behind Chattanooga (6-0). Furman falls to 5-12 overall and 0-6 in league play.

Atwood (Pensacola, Fla.) notched her fifth-career double-double performance, her second on the season, dropping 17 points and matching a season-high 10 rebounds. She paced the team in points and rebounds, and dished out a team-high four steals on the night. Brown followed with 14 points.

Things looked good for the Lady Eagles to start off as they scored 14 unanswered points in the first six minutes of the game. Katie Agin scored Furman’s first bucket at the 14:13 mark to end the drought. The Lady Paladins were able to chip away at the 12-point deficit by halftime and tie it up, 26-26 at the break.

Ashley Melson (Newnan, Ga.) and Carolyn Whitney (Duluth, Ga.) both tallied six points to lead the team, while Furman’s Melissa Liebschwager also dropped a team-high six points in the first half.

Furman notched its first lead of the game on a pair of free throws at the 18:41 mark of the second half. Thanks to Kendra Berry, the Lady Paladins took a two-point lead, 28-26.

Georgia Southern responded with an 8-0 run over the next three minutes that was sparked by a steal and a fast-break layup by Brown, and capped by another fast-break layup, again by Brown.

A steal by Furman’s Sarah Baker and her ensuing fast-break layup capped an 11-2 scoring drive by the Lady Paladins, good enough to take a three-point lead – the team’s largest lead of the game at 12:28.

Brown’s triple with 11:56 remaining tied the game at 39-39, and the two teams battled back and forth to three more ties over the next seven minutes.

Brown again answered with her second three-pointer at the 4:32 mark to take the final lead of the game (52-49). Atwood scored GSU’s final seven points of the game to seal the victory and secure the team’s fourth-consecutive victory of the season.

Georgia Southern outrebounded Furman 37-32. But Furman shot better from both the field and the free-throw line, hitting 19-of-44 (.432) and 9-of-13 (.692), respectively, compared to GSU’s 21-of-56 (.375) field-goal and 11-of-16 (.688) free-throw shooting.

The four-game win streak is the team’s best since last season’s run from Nov. 25 to Dec. 13, 2006.

Georgia Southern will continue its four-game homestand as it hosts College of Charleston, Saturday (Jan. 19) at Hanner Fieldhouse. Tip-off is slated for 3 p.m.

Category: Women's Basketball

Published on Monday, 14 January 2008 00:04