Abilene Christian's Lone Star Conference Starting 5 Fan Poll ... VOTING ENDS JAN. 29!
ABILENE – The Abilene Christian women's basketball team rides a season-best five-game winning streak into its rivalry week home-and-home series with Angelo State. The Wildcats and Rambelles will first meet Wednesday in San Angelo and then again Saturday night at Moody Coliseum.
Both games will air locally on 1280-AM KSLI. The ACU home contest also will be broadcast via the Internet at
SkyboxLive.com.
Saturday's home game also will serve as a Chapel Credit Night with special guests Guy and John Earle of
Think/Twice Ministries. The former NFL/CFL players will take to the court at halftime to deliver a high-energy message that intertwines biblical truth with life experiences from the football field. ACU students can earn two chapel credits by sliding their ID card before halftime of the women's game and then after halftime of the men's game.
Following consecutive wins last week vs. Incarnate Word and Texas A&M-Kingsville, the Wildcats find themselves in a three-way tie for first place in the Lone Star Conference with Midwestern State and Tarleton State at 7-2 and sharing the league's best overall record of 12-3 with the Mustangs.
The Cardinals are 1.0 game behind in the standings at 6-3, followed by West Texas A&M and Angelo State, which is 7-8 overall and 4-5 vs. the LSC.
ACU was forced to pull off a second-half comeback in each of its last two victories, starting with its 76-65 triumph over UIW. The Cardinals trailed by as many as 14 points midway through the first half, but pulled to within three at the break before taking over a minute into what became a seesaw second half.
UIW could never extend its lead past two points and the Wildcats capitalized with several runs that pushed their lead back to seven points at the 14 and eight-minute marks. The Cardinals made one last push following the third media timeout that led to their final lead at 60-58 and 5:07 remaining, but ACU tied the score less than a minute later and then went up by five on a
Kynzie Newman 3-pointer with 2:02 to go. The Wildcats also were clutch at the free-throw line by making their final 10 shots.
Against the Javelinas and without the services of all-America junior guard
Mackenzie Lankford, the Wildcats trailed 40-37 at halftime but responded with a 23-8 run to start the second half that pushed their lead back to double digits at 60-48.
Junior forward
Renata Marquez – who finished the game with 21 points – poured in eight points during this critical run with two 3-pointers to go along with a layup.
Kelsey Smith had 14 points at Kingsville, while
Savannah Smith added a career-high 13 points. Freshman
Whitney West, who started in place of Lankford, had five points, three rebounds and three assists.
Winners of eight of its last nine, ACU has already matched last year's win total of 12 and begins the week as the LSC's No. 1 team in scoring offense (77.3), 3-point field goals (9.0), scoring margin (+16.1), field goal percent defense (.340) and defensive rebounds (29.2). The Wildcats are No. 2 in free throw and 3-point field percentage (.735/.329), assists (16.1) and steals (10.2), and assist/turnover ratio (0.9).
Marquez is the clubhouse leader in points per game with 13.1, assists with 2.7 and steals with 1.9, while
Kelsey Smith leads ACU with 1.7 blocked shots and 6.9 rebounds.
Angelo State has lost four of its last five, including Saturday night at Incarnate Word, 52-60. The Rambelles also have fallen in recent days to Cameron, Midwestern State and Texas Woman's, but cruised past Kingsville at home last week, 65-51.
ASU ranks sixth in scoring offense and defense but is second in the league to ACU in field goal percentage defense (.356) and first in blocks per game with 4.1 led by LSC leader Lauren Holt (2.1 bpg).
Haylee Oliver (12.7ppg), Holt (11.9) and Leah Lemaire (11.2) pace the Rambelles' offense. Oliver also is tops on ASU in terms of rebounds (9.1) and assists (3.1) per game.
ACU has lost four straight to Angelo State but still leads the all-time series by a comfortable margin of 49-35.
