STATESBORO, Ga. - The Georgia Southern women's basketball team returns to action on Sunday, traveling to Orlando to face UCF in a 2 p.m. non-conference contest at CFE Arena.

The Eagles (3-4) have not played since suffering a 71-67 loss to Savannah State on November 29th. Georgia Southern broke for final exams this week, but returned to practice to prepare for the Knights (4-4), who similarly have been off since a 58-51 road loss at Sanford on November 30th. 

"It's been a good stretch of getting some work in. UCF plays different than most people," Georgia Southern Head Coach Kip Drown said. "The things we have been focusing on for three days are not necessarily things that will transfer to other teams that we play, like the 1-2-2 zone, and the 1-2-2 three-quarters trap. They are also a relentless rebounding team. It's going to be a good game for us, matching up with physicality inside, and we don't see that much zone in the Sun Belt and that's probably all we're going to see on Sunday."

The two teams met last season in Statesboro, with UCF winning 74-54, but Georgia Southern leads the overall series by a 13-4 margin. The two teams have alternated wins and losses over the last four meetings. The Knights went on to win 21 games and advance to the second round of the WNIT. Despite the struggles, Coach Drown knows this is a good team for the Eagles to face.

"This is a team that went to the WNIT last year," Coach Drown said. "They had a new coach come in last year [Katie Abrhamson-Henderson] who took over a new program with the same kids and turned it around. Explosive players, she put them into her system and it was a great fit. The pressure and the offensive rebounding were relentless and during stretches in the game last year, physically they manhandled us. They are a little different team this year. They lost leading scorer, who hit 5 threes on the night. As a team, they've only taken 49 threes all year. Shooting ball from the perimeter is not a strength and the best kid they had graduated. So offensively, they are going to pound it inside to their post players. And defensively, they are going to try and stretch things, even in their zone, and try to create turnovers."

Sophomore Nakol Franks has been a bright spot for the Eagles since earning a starting spot five games ago, leading Georgia Southern in scoring over that stretch while hitting a team-best 14 three-pointers. As Coach Drown said, UCF is a team that is not going to test the Eagles from long range - it has made just 11 threes on the year as an entire team, which ranks among the bottom five in NCAA Division I.

Colin Lacy will have the call on the Georgia Southern Sports Network and live stats are available from UCF. The Knights will also be providing live video through their subscription-based UCFKnights.tv site.