ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. – Coming off back-to-back Sunshine State Conference wins last week, the Eckerd College women's basketball program will look to keep the momentum moving forward tomorrow against Saint Leo University at 5:30 p.m. in the McArthur Center.
The Tritons (7-6, 4-2 SSC) find themselves near the top of the competitive league standings, tied for second with Lynn University.
After toppling Florida Southern College on the road and defending its home court against Barry University, EC has also compiled wins over nationally-ranked University of Tampa and Rollins College, then ranked No. 10 and No. 13, respectively.
“Saint Leo is a very athletic team that rebounds very well and it will be a chore for us to keep them off the glass,” EC Head Coach
Paul Honsinger said. “They have the league's two leading rebounders in (Chelsea) Connelly and (Chelsea) Williams. Krystal (Charles) has been doing a great job on the boards for us and we want to stay active on the glass by committee.”
The senior forward Charles was a deserving recipient of recent SSC Player of the Week presented by VALIC honors, capped off with a monster double-double of 16 points and 15 rebounds against Barry.
Junior forward
Liga Vente remains in the SSC's top 10 in scoring (13.5 ppg) while maintaining a near-49 percent shooting clip from the field, the fifth-best mark in the conference.
Freshman shooting guard
Annie Armstrong (ankle) has been sidelined after being injured at Florida Tech.
Her absence has been filled in admirably by key contributions from sophomores
Rana Thomas and
Taylor Bestry.
Thomas tied her career-best scoring total with 12 points in each of the last two games while Bestry caught fire from deep as the Tritons knocked down 11 three-point buckets on Saturday against Barry.
“They have both stepped up for us big in back-to-back games,” Honsinger said.
As a team, the Tritons are now shooting almost 78 percent at the free throw line, more than five percent better than Nova Southeastern University in second. Bestry, Thomas and Armstrong, rank one, two and three, among the SSC's leaders at the charity stripe.
Among all teams ranked nationally, Eckerd is sixth in that category and just 0.01 percent way from moving into the top five.
But the Lions (8-8, 3-3 SSC) aren't far behind in the pecking order at an even .500 and with the aforementioned glass eaters in Connelly (10.2 rpg) and Williams (8.6 rpg),
Charles (7.5 rpg) ranks in third in the SSC in rebounding per game only behind the Saint Leo duo.
Saint Leo boasts the conference's third-leading scorer in Teresa Manigrasso (15.2 ppg) and handed Nova Southeastern its lone loss in the conference standings. The Lions also handed Tampa a 20-point margin of defeat last week.
Live stats and video/audio of the game will be streamed live on EckerdTritons.com.
