Feb. 6, 2010
Game Notes in PDF Format 
The University of Memphis women's basketball team (13-8, 6-2 C-USA) will head out on a one-game road swing to face an athletic Houston (11-10, 5-3) club Sunday at 1 p.m.
The Cougars have won three of their last four games, including a decisive 72-53 win over Rice to hand the Owls their first conference home loss of the season. The Cougar front line of Brittney Scott, Courtney Taylor and Lesslee Mason will give the Tiger posts all they can handle. Scott leads the team in scoring with 17.0 points, while Taylor averages a double-double of 15.4 points and 10.0 rebounds per game. Mason is right behind Taylor on the glass with 9.8 rebounds a game and is second on the team with 22 blocks on the season. She also averages 8.1 points per game.
In the back court, sophomore guard Porsche Landry powers the club with 9.4 points per game, and has already dished out 87 assists on the season. Also a threat shooting the ball, Landry hits 43.6 percent from the floor. Fellow sophomore guard Brittany Mason is one of the Cougar's three-point threats, connecting on 18 attempts. Scott is the team's most frequent three-point shooter, having connected on 54 of 167 attempts so far this season to lead the team.
The Cougars played a tough non-conference schedule, playing Oregon State, LSU, Miami, Princeton, Kansas and TCU, and the schedule has prepped them for league play, as Houston went 2-2 in its first four games, beating Tulane and UTEP both on the road before losing in overtime to East Carolina and Marshall back in Hofheinz. Since the Marshall loss, the Cougars are 3-1 in their last four games, including wins over UAB and Tulsa.
The Cougars will want to up the scoring, as they average 70.0 ppg, while holding their opponents to 67.5. The battle on the glass will be especially crucial for this game, as both Memphis and Houston are getting out-rebounded by their opponents for the season, and establishing tempo may depend on who controls the glass.
Memphis is at the halfway point of its C-USA schedule, but needs to steal some road wins with four of the remaining eight games coming away from the Bluff City. The Tigers are 3-1 on the road in league play so far this season, but lost their last road game at East Carolina, 76-59.
The Series History
This will be the 21st meeting between Houston and Memphis, but the series has been all Cougars as of late, as Houston has claimed six straight wins in the series over the past six seasons.
Balanced Bench Helps Tigers to UAB Win
Memphis bounced back from its second C-USA loss with a big performance from the bench in the win Thursday night. Junior Alex Winchell and freshman Nicole Dickson each scored 16 points in the victory, and freshman guard Chatia Kelsey scored four points and earned three trips to the free-throw line, adding a steal in 14 minutes of play.
McFerrin Inching Back to .500
Memphis already got head coach Melissa McFerrin a win at her alma mater with a 75-74 win at Missouri, and the Tigers can get her another gift if they can get a win at Houston on Sunday. In just her second season with the Tigers, McFerrin is just one win under the .500 mark at 25-26. Memphis was 12-18 last season and the team's 13 wins ties the win total from the 2004-05 season.
The last time Memphis has had 14 or more wins in a season was a 21 season in 2003-04. Since the calendar rolled to 2000 (2000-01 season), Memphis has had just two seasons with more than 14 wins.
Carter Among the Country's Best Sophomores
Sophomore guard Brittany Carter is already putting in a season that ranks among the University of Memphis' sophomore record book, but the Georgia native is also one of the best sophomores in the country, ranking fifth in the NCAA in scoring among sophomores with her 18.6 ppg average.
Carter's 382 points is already the seventh-best sophomore single season total in the Memphis record book. She needs 5 more points to pass Wanda Dillard's 387 point mark for 6th overall and needs 18 more points to hit 400 to become just the fifth Tiger sophomore in school history to score 400 or more points in a single season.
Carter's 49-point outing against Sacramento State at the University of Washington tournament over Thanksgiving is still the NCAA's best single game performance this season and is one of just 11 40-plus point performances in the country so far this season.
Upside Down in Rebounds
Heading in to league play, the Tigers had been out-rebounded in seven games, but just one time by double-digit rebounds. Since C-USA play began, Memphis has been out-rebounded in six of the eight games, and four of those have been by double digits, including both games last weekend (Marshall and ECU). The Tigers have out-rebounded just two league opponents, out-working Rice by a +10 margin on the glass in the overtime win at FedExForum and sneaking past UAB +5 in the win Thursday night while the Blazers were without their leading rebounder.
Regular Season Winding Down
Of the eight regular season games remaining, exactly half of them are on the road. If Memphis wants to stay in at least a tie for the league (depending on SMU and Tulane's Friday games), the Tigers will need to protect their home court and steal some wins on the road in league play. Of the remaining road venues, Memphis has a combined 23-21 overall record (5-4 at Houston; 10-6 at Tulane; 0-2 at UTEP; and 8-9 at UAB). Some of those wins are from earlier in each school's respective history, with Memphis' last win in Houston coming in 2002-03; in New Orleans in 2007-08, and last season at UAB. Memphis has never won a road game in El Paso.
Dickson Posts Back-to-Back-to-Back Double-Digit Outings for First Time in Collegiate Career
The struggle for the Tiger offense this season has been to find other consistent scorers to take some of the defensive attention off of Brittany Carter. Freshman Nicole Dickson started her Tiger career with a bang, scoring 20 points in the loss to Indiana at FedExForum in the season opener. She added a career-best 24 points in the win over UT Martin three games later, but once she was on the scouting report, found the double-digit outings a bit more difficult to come by, hitting 10 points just three more times in the next 14 games. But following her last 10 point game (at Marshall), she followed that up with a 16-point game at East Carolina, and a 16-point night in the win over UAB. That marked the first time in her career that she has posted back-to-back-to-back double digit scoring outings in her Tiger career.
Ellis in Junior Single Season Records
Junior center Savannah Ellis leads Memphis with 28 blocked shots so far this season. That ties the 7th-best single season mark for Memphis juniors. Ellis is tied with Damita Shazier's (1987-88) mark and is just one behind Glynetha Davis' mark from 1987-88. Ellis needs five more blocks to move in to the overall single season top 10 at Memphis. The Wichita, Kan., native currently ranks fourth at Memphis in career blocked shots with 83.
Fellow junior Taylor Mumphrey is also moving up in the junior single season records, with 25 blocked shots, which is the 10th-best single season total among the junior classes.
Getting Defensive
Looking at overall stats, Memphis ranks sixth in C-USA with 64.0 ppg given up in scoring defense. But since the calendar rolled to 2010 and Conference USA play, the Tigers have gotten downright stingy, holding opponents to just 60.0 ppg (1st in the league) and ranking first in the league-only stats by holding opponents to just 36.2 percent from the floor.
Stingy Defense
Overall C-USA Games Only
Scoring Defense 6th (64.0) 1st (60.0)
Field Goal % Defense 4th (38.0) 1st (36.2)
3 Pt FG % Defense 3rd (30.9) 1st (26.3)
Steals 2nd (11.0) 2nd (11.8)
Blocks 4th (3.5) 7th (3.1)
The 400 Club?
With so many new faces on the Memphis roster (eight newcomers to the court this year), Memphis will not likely have a 1,000 career point celebration this year, but might be making some progress toward some future celebrations with four different players working toward their 400th career points.
Sophomore Ramses Lonlack was the first to pass the 400 point mark with her three points against UAB, putting her at 402. Savannah Ellis needs just nine more points for her 400th career point, while Brittany Carter is just 18 points away. Senior guard LaToya Bullard needs 46 more points to get her 400th career point and needs just one more assist for her 200th career assist.
Winchell Knocks Down 100th Career Triple; Looking For Point 600
With a pair of three-point field goals in the win over Jackson State, Alex Winchell knocked down Nos. 100 and 101 from three-point range, becoming just the seventh Tiger in Memphis history to hit 100 or more career threes.
Heading in to the Houston game, Winchell has 116 career threes and is now 21 points shy of her 600th career point.
Road Warriors
Memphis won half of its games last year on the road (6 of 12), including a 4-4 mark in C-USA play. The Tigers started league road with a 3-0 mark this year, picking up wins at East Division foes UCF, Southern Miss and Marshall, before falling victim to East Carolina and the Pirates 10-0 home record.
About Our Opponents:
Here is a look at what our non-conference opponents are up to:
Indiana (12-10, 5-6 Big 10): Upset No. 4/6 Ohio State, 67-62; plays at Illinois, Sunday.
Murray State (10-11, 5-5 OVC): Won fourth straight home game, 77-69, over Tennessee State; hosts Austin Peay, Saturday.
Missouri (11-10, 1-7 Big 12): Lost to No. 10 Texas A&M, 65-55; hosts No. 19/22 Iowa State,Sunday.
UT Martin (6-15, 4-7 OVC): Won second straight home game, 79-70, over Austin Peay; hosts Tennessee State, Saturday .
Sacramento State (9-12, 5-4 Big Sky): Won fifth straight game, 83-78, at Portland State; hosts league-leading Eastern Washington, Sunday.
Eastern Washington (14-7, 7-1 Big Sky): Remains in first place in the Big Sky and picked up a non-conference win over Seattle University, 67-50; hosts Sacramento State, Saturday.
FIU (10-13, 5-7 Sun Belt): Won on the road at Louisiana, 77-51;hosts North Texas at noon.
South Alabama (13-10, 8-4 Sun Belt): Lost to New Orleans, 68-47; hosts Middle Tennessee, Saturday.
Ole Miss (14-8, 5-4 SEC): Lost at No. 20 Kentucky, 80-66; plays at LSU Sunday
Northwestern State (12-8, 5-2 SLC): Won fourth league road game, 65-52, at McNeese State; hosts UT-Arlington, Saturday.
Louisiana Tech (14-6, 5-3 WAC): Downed Boise State, 75-53; plays at Utah State, Saturday.
Jackson State (2-17, 1-8 SWAC): Lost 65-46 at UA-Pine Bluff, hosts Alcorn State, Saturday.
Saint Louis (7-15, 1-6 A-Ten): Lost to Duquesne, 61-54; begins second half of A-10 schedule at Dayton, Sunday.
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