ABILENE – Tied for first place in the Lone Star Conference, the Abilene Christian women's basketball team can begin to separate itself from the rest of the pack by beating the West Texas A&M Lady Buffs and Eastern New Mexico Zias for a second time this season.
The Wildcats face WT at home Tuesday night at 5:30 p.m. and Eastern on the road Saturday at 3 p.m. (CT). Both games will be broadcast locally on 1280-AM KSLI. ACU's home doubleheader vs. Buffaloes also will be streamed over the Internet via SkyboxLive.com for $2.99.
ACU begins the week on a seven-game winning streak and tied for first in the conference with Midwestern State and Tarleton State at 9-2. The Wildcats and Mustangs also share the league's best overall record at 14-3.
Incarnate Word sits a game behind at 8-3 followed by the Lady Buffs (7-4), Commerce (4-6), Angelo State (4-7) and Texas Woman's (4-7). Eastern New Mexico, meanwhile, has lost its last five games, dropping it to 3-16 overall and 2-9 vs. the conference.
The Wildcats played very well defensively last week in capturing their first sweep over Angelo State since 2004-05. ACU limited the Rambelles to 52.0 points per game and .371 shooting percentage (.371) as they connected on just 3-of-22 3-point attempts (.136) and coughed up the ball 39 times.
ACU's 3-point defense is one of the best in the nation with the Wildcats ranking second with a .224 percentage. And even though it struggled offensively at the Junell Center in scoring only 53 points, the Wildcats' scoring offense still ranks 13th nationally with 75.6 points per game and sixth with 8.7 3-pointers made per game.
West Texas is also on a bit of a roll, having won its last five and nine of its last 11 since starting the year at 2-7. One of those early-season losses was an 81-76 home defeat to the Wildcats, which was ACU's first at the First United Bank Center since February of 2010. The Lady Buffs allowed four Wildcats to score in double figures that night – led by
Renata Marquez' double-double of 19 points and 10 rebounds. WT's early season woes were then compounded by a double-overtime loss to Angelo State and 19-point whipping at Midwestern State.
The Lady Buffs seemed to turn their season following a 25-point thrashing of Cameron, because since then, their lone defeats have come vs. a very good Emporia State team in overtime, 69-65, and on the road at Incarnate Word, 51-50.
West Texas A&M owns the league's second-best scoring defense, allowing 58.8 points per game – however, the Wildcats are the only team this season to score more than 80 points against them. Southwestern Oklahoma State was the next closest with 79 points, while Midwestern State was the last team to score more than 70 on the Lady Buffs – all they way back on Dec. 5.
Offensively, West Texas has the LSC's No. 2 field goal percentage of .432 and is tops in assists with 16.5 per game. Lady Buff Devin Griffin is third in the league in scoring with 15.9 points per game, while her teammate Chontiquah White is sixth with 13.4 per game. This duo also ranks among the league's top rebounders with 6.8 and 8.0 per game, respectively.
Casey Land leads her team in assists (3.5) and steals (1.4), and is also WT's best 3-point shooter (.342).
Eastern New Mexico lost to West Texas twice last week by scores of 62-51 and 70-43 and will first visit Angelo State Wednesday night before playing host to the Wildcats. The Zias' last win was a 65-58 decision over last-place Kingsville on Jan. 10.
Eastern – which ACU defeated on Dec. 1, 74-56 – is averaging 50.5 points per game this season behind a.358 field-goal percentage.
