Dec. 15, 2008

** Update from the Bahamas: Tiger fans, just a quick note to let you know our game against UTA might tip later than 8 p.m. (ET) because we are the fourth game of the day for the gym. The three games before us are scheduled at 2, 4, and 6 p.m., so it's likely to be later than 7 p.m. Central Time before we get tipped. The game can be heard on WUMR, 91.7 FM. - Tammy DeGroff

Complete Game Notes in PDF Format

The University of Memphis women's basketball team (5-5) is looking to warm up its offense and snap a three-game losing streak heading in to the Sunsplash Shootout in the Bahamas this week. The Tigers will face UT Arlington on Thursday at 8 p.m. (ET) in the first round of the tournament, and will play either Winthrop or Georgia Tech on the second day of games on Saturday.

Memphis has struggled away from the Elma Roane Fieldhouse after going 5-0 to start the season in home games. Memphis dropped a pair of non-conference games played down at FedExForum, and has lost all three true road games (at Belmont, Ole Miss, Mississippi State). The neutral site games in Nassau will be the first neutral site games of the season for the Tigers.

UTA is much more experienced in playing away from their home court in Arlington. The Mavericks have only played one home game in their first eight outings, and have already gone 2-1 on the road against Conference USA foes, defeating SMU in Dallas 85-79 in their season opener, and then falling at Marshall 82-72. The Mavericks then defeated Rice on the road in Houston, 77-72. The Mavericks also took it to No. 18 Kansas State on the road, just getting edged, 73-63 in Manhattan on Sunday.

Senior forward Candice Champion leads the team with 15.6 points, adding 8.5 rebounds a night. Another senior forward, Erin Dixon, averages a double-double with 13.6 points and 11.8 rebounds per game, adding a team-high 13 three-point field goals, while guard Tamara Simmons adds 11.8 points per game, while leading the team with 29 assists.

UTA is a team that likes to get the high-percentage shots from its front court, and is hitting 42.9 percent from the field so far this season.

Senior guard Paris Leonard is coming off a 20-point outing in the Mississippi State loss, having scored the team's first eight points of the game. She averages 17.6 points and 5.0 rebounds per game, and leads the team with 33 steals and 19 three-point field goals made. Fellow senior Ashley Thornton is next in scoring, with 10.2 points and a team-best 8.8 rebounds per game, while freshman guard Ramses Lonlack leads the guard corps in scoring with 9.4 points and 5.6 rebounds per game. Lonlack is coming off her first career double-double against Mississippi State, where she had 12 points and 11 rebounds.

In the three consecutive losses, Memphis has shot just 35.0 percent from the floor and 28.9 percent from three-point range. The Tigers have also been out-rebounded 40.7-39.3 in those losses and have committed 84 turnovers (28.0/game) while forcing just 51 turnovers for the opposition (17.0/game). The Tigers, which had been leading C-USA with over 10 steals a game, have averaged just 7.0 steals in the last three outings and the lack of success with the defensive pressure has slowed down the offense to just 55.7 points per outing.

About UT Arlington
This is the second meeting between the Tigers and UT Arlington. Memphis leads the overall series 1-0, winning the only other meeting 90-69 back in 1984-85 in Memphis.

UTA returns eight letterwinners and three starters off a team that went 19-10 last season, finishing tied for second in the Southland with a 13-3 overall mark.

The Tigers have faced one other Southland opponent this season, defeating Stephen F. Austin in the championship game of the 24th Annual Piggly Wiggly Classic to improve to 5-2 on the season back on Nov. 28th.

The Tigers will be the fourth Conference USA opponent for the Mavericks this season. UTA is 2-1 against C-USA to date, having beaten both SMU and Rice on the road and falling at Marshall by 10.

About Georgia Tech
Georgia Tech just broke in to the national rankings at No. 25 in the AP poll with its 8-2 overall mark. The Yellow Jackets' two losses have come at No. 1 Connecticut, 82-71, and vs. No. 9 Texas, 76-68. Tech has won four straight games, picking up wins over Tennessee Tech, Michigan State, Georgia and Oregon in its last four outings by an average of 13.8 points per game.

Sophomore forward Alex Montgomery leads Georgia Tech with 13.0 points and 5.1 rebounds per game, adding 21 steals and a team-best 24 three-point field goals made. Another super sophomore, Iasia Hemingway adds 12.5 points per game and has 31 of her 46 rebounds coming off the offensive glass. Senior guard Jacqua Williams already has 43 steals through the first 10 games, and leads the offense with 38 assists against 36 turnovers while adding 11.9 points per game. Williams is also a threat from three-point range, having connected on 13 of 32 attempts.

Both the Tigers and the Yellow Jackets sport a Wooddale HS product on their respective rosters. Memphis' leading scorer is Wooddale grad Paris Leonard, while sophomore guard Deja Foster has seen action in nine games for Georgia Tech this season, and currently ranks fifth on the team in scoring (8.3) and fourth in rebounding (4.4/game). She has also forced 20 steals on the season, ranking her third on the squad behind Williams and Montgomery. Another name Tiger fans will recognize from the Yellow Jacket roster is Associate Head Coach Sytia Messer. Messer was an assistant coach for Joye Lee-McNelis at Memphis from 2003-2004, helping the Tigers to a 34-25 overall record in her two seasons here.

Georgia Tech is coming off a 22-10 season and finished fifth in the ACC last season with a 7-7 overall mark. Should the Tigers and Georgia Tech face one another, it would mark the first meeting in school history between the two programs.

About Winthrop
Winthrop is a team that Memphis has a more recent history with, having faced the Eagles in both team's season-opening games of the 2006-07 season at the Louisville tournament. Winthrop, then a team of most sophomores, upended the Tigers 83-60 in the first meeting between the two programs. That bunch of mostly sophomores now makes up a roster that sports six seniors, five of which played against the Tigers in the first meeting. In that first meeting, all five Eagle starters scored double-digit points, and all five of them are back on the Winthrop roster coming in to the potential match-up with the Tigers again in 2008-09.

Senior forward Ashley Fann again leads the team with 14.1 points and 9.4 rebounds, hitting 42.9 percent from the floor, while senior center Jennifer Walker, the one senior who did not play in the earlier meeting between the two teams as the Memphis native was at Walters State CC, added 12 points in her first game of the season against George Mason back on Dec. 7th, the Eagles' last game. Walker was sitting out a six-game suspension, and if she continues at the same scoring clip coming in to her second game of the season, she would give Winthrop three double-digit scorers with senior guard Tiffany Rodd adding 10.0 points a night. Rodd is the lone Eagle with double-digit threes on the season.

The Eagles will probably have seen enough of scrimmaging against one another by the time the tournament begins, as the team has not played a game since Dec. 7th. A non-conference game schedule at Georgia State was moved back to January, leaving an 11-day gap in the schedule for the Eagles.

Lonlack Nets Double-Double at Mississippi State
Freshman guard Ramses Lonlack became the third Tiger of the season to net a double-double with her 12 point, 11-rebound effort in the loss at Mississippi State. Ashley Thornton and Savannah Ellis each have had double-doubles this season, and both Ellis and Lonlack have gotten their first career double-doubles in the early going.

Lonlack's double-double is the first double-double for a Tiger guard since LaToya Bullard had a double-double of 13 points and 12 assists last season against UCF. The last Tiger guard to have a double-double of points and rebounds was teammate Paris Leonard, who had a double-double of 26 points and 13 rebounds against Austin Peay as a freshman in Memphis' Thanksgiving tournament.

Taking Care of the Basketball
Part of the Tigers' three-game skid has been a battle with getting the basketball where it's supposed to go. The Tigers are averaging 28 turnovers a game in the last three outings, getting forced in to bad decisions to the tune of an 84-51 disadvantage in turnover column. And the common problem with turnovers is they tend to turn to layups on the other end. And when the opposition is getting layups, they take away one of the Tigers' spark plugs to its own offense in steals. Memphis was averaging over 10 steals a game coming in to the last three games, but with little chance to get in to a defensive set against teams driving for layups, the Tigers have managed just 21 steals in the last three games (7.0/game).

Leonard Moves to 16th All-Time
Senior guard Paris Leonard's 20-point night moved her ahead of former teammate Devin Necaise on the all-time scoring list. Leonard now ranks 16th with 1060 points, but is a ways away from breaking in to the top 15, needing another 125 points to catch Lynn Enzweiler's mark of 1185 points.

Tigers Lose 2007-08 Starting Point Guard
The Tigers will be without junior point guard LaToya Bullard for the 2008-09 season after the Memphis native underwent season-ending surgery on Dec. 15th. Bullard hopes to be back for the 2009-2010 season.

About Our Opponents:
Here is a look at how our past and upcoming opponents have fared as of late:

Northern Arizona (3-8): Lost at Southern Utah, 76-64; hosts UMKC, Tuesday.
Belmont (6-2, 2-0 A-Sun): Won both A-Sun games, then edged Tennessee State, 78-72; will break for exams and return Wednesday by hosting UT Martin.
Louisiana Tech (5-4): Won third straight game with an 82-59 win over Sam Houston State; plays at LSU Monday.
Ole Miss (7-2): Suffered second straight loss with a 46-42 loss at NC State; hosts UALR Wednesday.
Ohio (3-5): Led wire-to-wire in a 67-53 win at Marshall; plays home opener, Friday, against Cleveland State.
Wichita State (6-2): Improved to 6-2 on the season with a 73-60 win over UA Pine Bluff; hosts Kent State, Wednesday.
Stephen F. Austin (5-4): Snapped three-game skid with a 66-63 win over New Orleans; plays Missouri State in Cancun on Friday.
Arkansas (8-2): Bounced back from a loss at Kansas State with an 85-73 win over North Dakota; breaks for exams and then hosts Dartmouth, Thursday.
South Alabama (8-2): Finished non-conference schedule with a 55-49 win at
Western Illinois; hosts Western Kentucky, Wednesday, in Sun Belt play.
Mississippi State (7-0): Remained perfect with an 81-49 win over Memphis; plays at Southern Miss, Tuesday.
UT Arlington (3-5): Hung with No. 18 Kansas State, but fell short, 73-63; plays Memphis Thursday.
No. 25 Georgia Tech (8-2): Broke in to the national rankings with a 74-59 win at Oregon; plays Winthrop Thursday.
Winthrop (4-3): Won second straight game with a 58-42 win over George Mason; breaks for exams and then faces Georgia Tech in opening round of Sunsplash Shootout in the Bahamas, Dec. 18th.
Tennessee Tech (2-6, 1-0 OVC): Won Ohio Valley opener, 84-60; break for final exams, then hosts Evansville, Thursday.
UAB (2-6): Fell at Central Michigan, 96-72; hosts the Blazer Invitational Monday and Tuesday, opening against Alabama State, Monday.
UCF (1-7): Dropped sixth straight game, 77-64, at Florida Gulf Coast; plays at Jacksonville, Monday.
Southern Miss (5-4): Won second straight game, 64-47, against Southeast Missouri; hosts Mississippi State, Tuesday.
Rice (3-3): Dropped second straight game, falling to UT Arlington, 77-72; hosts UCLA after a break for exams, Wednesday.
Houston (6-2): Won third straight game, 68-57, over Cal Poly; plays at St. Johns tournament against Boston College, Saturday.
East Carolina (5-3): Got first road win of the season, 68-63, at UNC Wilmington; hosts Gardner-Webb, Tuesday.
Marshall (5-3): Dropped second straight game, 67-53, to Ohio; hosts Houston Baptist, Tuesday.
UTEP (5-4): Downed Mississippi Valley State, 85-52; plays at New Mexico, Tuesday.
Tulane (5-3): Won fourth straight game, 66-55 vs. Indiana State; plays at Nicholls State following exams, Wednesday.
SMU (3-5): Defeated North Texas, 74-57; hosts Dartmouth, Tuesday.
Tulsa (3-5): Fell at UALR, 63-46; plays at Oklahoma, Sunday.