Mincey’s club opens busy week with Anderson
December 8, 2020

Mincey’s club opens busy week with Anderson

JEFFERSON CITY, Tenn. – Turn you clocks back to 9 a.m on March 12, Carson-Newman was on the court at Finis-Horne Arena preparing for a first round NCAA Tournament game against Anderson. Hours later the tournament was cancelled and the world was turned on its head by Covid-19.

C-N Game Notes (PDF)

JEFFERSON CITY, Tenn. – Turn you clocks back to 9 a.m on March 12, Carson-Newman was on the court at Finis-Horne Arena preparing for a first round NCAA Tournament game against Anderson. Hours later the tournament was cancelled and the world was turned on its head by Covid-19.

While the global pandemic continues to require diligence and caution, the Lady Eagles are ready to a South Atlantic Conference regular-season game against the Trojans slated for 5:30 p.m. Wednesday evening at Holt Fieldhouse in the first of four games over the next seven days.

Carson-Newman (1-0, 1-0) is coming off of its lowest scoring output in a home game in 61 contests dating back to a 55-point effort against Tusculum on Feb. 17, 2016. Over that period, the club had posted more 100-point showcases, 19, than outings with fewer than 70 points, three. From 2016 to the start of this year, a four-year stretch, the program posted 92 points per game (5,333 in 58 games) inside of Holt Fieldhouse.

"We have always hung our hat on the offensive side of the ball," Carson-Newman coach Mike Mincey said. "If we did get it inside [against Newberry] we didn't make them pay. If we see any kind of zone, we are going to have to do a lot better job. Shooting four of 15 from the three in our home gym – we shoot more threes in this gym in practice than anybody. They shouldn't be able to come in here and make more threes than we do."

The Lady Eagles picked up a wire-to-wire win the opener after posting eight such affairs last season. Leading by as many as 19 points in the victory, the unit has produced 11 matchups in a row with a double-digit lead at some point in the game. Dating back to the start of the 2017-18 campaign, Mincey's club has held a double-digit lead in 75 of 96 tussles, 78 percent.

With 34 points in the paint in the victory over Newberry on Wednesday, the Orange and Blue continued a trend from a year ago when the program went 17-4 when posting at least 30 points in the lane versus a 5-4 mark when being held below that mark.

Two of the best players in league history will not be on the floor as anticipated in that March matchup. C-N's Kayla Marosites, a consensus All-American, and two-time SAC Player of the year and two-time first-team All-American Alexy Mollenhauer graduated from Anderson (3-1, 3-1).

The Lady Eagles hold a 13-12 edge in the first 25 games of the series but the Trojans have won each of the last four. Three of those games have been decided by one possession including a 102-100 double overtime affair at Mossy Creek on Feb. 1. McKenzie Gadson drilled a 25-foot buzzer beater to topple C-N. Anderson dominated the paint in the two meetings to the tune of 68-40.

These two programs have won five of the last six league trophies and have been going back and forth for league supremacy. Anderson is 100-27 overall and 73-15 in SAC play over the last three years while Mincey's crew is 97-29 and 67-18 in conference affairs.

Mollenhauer is one of three players in SAC history to score at least 1,000 points and 1,000 rebounds for her career with 1,949 and 1,017 respectively. She averaged 20 points and a dozen boards as a senior. Anderson also has to replace Madison Baggett, a multi-time All-SAC pick that started 117 games over four years and hold the lone triple-double against the Lady Eagles in history. The do-it-all point guard scored 1,121 points adding 716 rebounds and 504 assists.

Coach Jonathon Barbaree's unit dropped its lone road game, the opener at Catawba, and have since rattled off three straight wins at home by single digits over Newberry, Limestone and Lenoir-Rhyne.

Offensively, the Trojans are sixth in the league in scoring at 66 points per game ranking ninth in field-goal percentage (35), free-throw percentage (65) and eighth in long range accuracy (28). They are average 27 foul shots per game, tops in the conference.

Jalyn Spurlin leads a group of three players averaging double figures this year with 14.5 per game, eighth in the league. It has been boom or bust however with two games of 20-plus points and two in single digits. She is shooting 58 percent from the floor.

Anderson is middle of the pack defensively allowing 65 points per game behind nearly six blocks per night, second best in the league. Opponents are shooting 37 percent from the field, good for fifth. It is second in the conference in rebounding at 45 per game with a plus-four advantage. Five players are posting at least five per night.

Fans can enjoy a night of basketball for free on the Eagle Sports Network. If residents of the Lakeway region want to kick back to listen to the radio they can flip on The Mountain 106.3 WPFT-FM. For those outside of the area, a high definition video stream and an audio option is available on cneagles.com/live beginning at 5:15 p.m. with "The Appalachian Electric Cooperative Countdown to Tip-Off".

- CN -

Highlights Game Notes Photos Audio Video Live stats Recap Box Score Box Score