STATESBORO – The Georgia Southern women's basketball team opened the regular season in fine fashion Friday night, defeating North Carolina A&T 65-50 inside Hanner Fieldhouse. The Eagles led from the opening tip to the final horn and showed the crowd gathered inside Hanner the kind of tempo and solid shooting head coach Kip Drown has been preaching since his arrival.

Senior forward/center Patrice Butler led all players with 22 points, including three three-pointers, and extended her current streak of games where she finished in double figures to 10, dating back to last season. Butler shot 70% (7-10) from the field and was perfect at the charity stripe (5-5) in 27 minutes of work. Junior guard Trellanie English-Lurry scored a career-high 15 points off the bench, hitting on five of her eight attempts (62.5%) from the field, including three treys. The three treys matched her career high set last season at Mercer. The final Eagle to finish the contest in double-digits was senior guard Angel McGowan with 10 points. McGowan went 6-for-8 from the free throw line and added four rebounds and a pair of steals.

As a team, the Eagles shot 41.7% (20-48) from the field, including an impressive 53.8% (7-13) in the opening quarter. Georgia Southern went 8-for-19 (42.1%) from three-point range and was 5-for-8 (62.5%) from beyond the arc in the first quarter. On the other side, Georgia Southern held the Aggies to just 30.0% (18-60) shooting and limited NCAT to a 27.3% (6-22) performance from three-point range.

Dana Brown led North Carolina A&T, an NCAA Tournament participant last season, with 18 points off 5-for-14 shooting (35.7%) and hit a game-high five three-pointers. Alexus Lessears just missed out on a double-double as she finished with 10 points and eight rebounds, matching Sierra Butler for most boards in the game.

THE STORY
Butler got the Eagles (1-0) off to a hot start as she hit her first two three pointers within the span of just 58 seconds, opening up a 6-0 lead for the home team. She then added a pair of free throws and another trey less than two minutes later, putting Georgia Southern up 11-2 before the Aggies were able to settle into any form of offense.

From there, the Eagles continued to push the tempo, keeping the Aggies (0-1) on their heels for much of the game despite turning the ball over 24 times. Georgia Southern forced 21 turnovers in the game and scored 20 of their points off the NCAT miscues.

While Georgia Southern out-scored the Aggies in three of the four quarters, they did their most damage in both the first and third quarters. The Eagles opened the game with 23 points in the opening stanza and then out-scored the Aggies 13-3 in the third. After three quarters of play, GS led 52-30 and was able to cruise to the season-opening victory while getting every available player some valuable playing time.

NOTES
- Georgia Southern is now 2-0 all-time against the Aggies. The last time the two programs met was back on Nov. 23, 1996 when Georgia Southern defeated North Carolina A&T 74-50 in the Lady Bucs Classic held in Johnson City, Tenn.
- Friday night was the first time Georgia Southern has opened the season with a win since the 2009-10 season. That year, Rusty Cram's Eagles opened the year with a 96-44 home win over Brewton Parker.
- The Eagles are now 24-20 all-time in season openers, and 17-10 in season openers at home.
- Senior Patrice Butler has now scored in double figures in 10 straight games, dating back to the Eagles' 78-64 win over Texas State at home on Feb. 6.
- Friday night was the 40th time Butler has scored in double digits. It was also the seventh time she has scored at least 20 points as well as the 20th time she has led the Eagles in scoring.
- Junior guard Trellanie English-Lurry netted a career-high 15 points, eclipsing her previous mark of 11 that she set twice last season.
- English-Lurry also matched her career-high for three-pointers in a game with three.
- Junior forward Sierra Butler has now led GS in rebounding in 10 games in her career as she ended Friday night's game with eight boards.
- Senior guard Angel McGowan now has 1,010 career point and 152 career steals. She ranks 22^nd all-time in points scored and is just nine points away from 21^st and 10 points away from 20^th. Her 152 steals has her currently 14^th in program history. She is just one away from 13^th, three away from 12^th and eight away from 11^th.
- Head coach Kip Drown is now 471-348 all-time and 8-22 at Georgia Southern.

QUOTES FROM COACH KIP DROWN
Overall on the game
 "North Carolina A&T is a very solid basketball team. They were in the NCAA Tournament last year after winning their conference and they were picked to win (the MEAC) again this year. They are very athletic, they created a lot of pressure. To be honest, I was really glad for us to go against that because that's the sort of team and play that we're going to see in the Sun Belt. The more we can see it and handle it, the better off we will be down the road. But I was very happy with our effort, very happy with how we came out and shot the ball right from the start. Patrice got us off to a great start and I thought Trellanie settled us down. We were a little off at that point, but she came in and I thought she did a great job at the point getting us settled back down."

On the pace of the game
"(NCAT) is one of those teams where you have to go, whether you want to or not. They make you go. They're fast and they're going to get out there and move the ball up the court and make you run with them and if you don't attack they're going to make you pay. We want to play that way, we want to be aggressive and attack and set the tempo. But looking at the stat sheet, I see 24 turnovers and that's the biggest stat of the night for me. We just turned the ball over a little too much. We have to make better decisions when we play at that tempo. Some people think you're very disciplined when you play very slow and everything, but I think you're a disciplined team when you can play fast and still make good decisions with the ball."

NEXT UP
Georgia Southern plays again at home on Sunday, Nov. 13, against Thomas University. The Eagles and Night Hawks will tip off at 2 p.m. in Hanner Fieldhouse before the Eagles open a stretch of four games on the road.

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