[Sly Fox]

The Lady Flames begin a 4-game road trip at High Point Wednesday evening. In fact, they are away from Vines in 6 of the next 7 and 2 of the next 8 contests. This should result in a real test as the team tries to reestablish its identity after losing Megan for the season. We're riding a 6-game win streak but face a real tough challenge down in North Carolina.



High Point Official Site

Overall Record: 12-4
Big South Record: 3-0

A closer inspection of HPU's record reveals not many quality wins. The three quality opponents (South Carolina, Stephen F. Austin & Virginia Tech) were all losses including a pair of drubbing by USC and VT. They have a strong starting five but not much off the bench.


#11 Katie Ralls
5' 7" Junior Guard
Averaging 8.9 Pts, 3.6 Rebs & 3.3 Assists



#12 Leslie Cook
5' 11" Junior Guard
Averaging 10.3 Pts & 3.8 REbs



#14 Candyce Sellers
5' 6" Junior Guard
Averaging 10.8 Pts, 3.9 Rebs & 3.3 Assists



#24 Raven Truslow
5' 11" Sophomore Guard
Averaging 8.1 Pts & 3.8 Rebs



#45 Katie O'Dell
5' 10" Senior Forward
Averaging 15.3 Pts & 7.4 Rebs

[thesportscritic]

All I have to say is bring it on. I would hope the team is fired up especially for High Point especially when the majority of the this team was on last year's team and lost on our home floor. It should be interesting. Normally their bench is not good whatsoever. A decent starting 5. If UNCA can stop Odell then I am sure that we can too.

[beigledog]

We should be able to beat them with our size. We've got a lot of height on them...even without Megan. Anybody know what the current rebound margin is for the season? I know it was getting up there around 12 or 13 per game.

[BJWilliams]

According to the Liberty Flames website its at about 12 per game.

[Stevev]

i am hoping that the revenge factor from last year will offset whatever momentum they gained in their last win and home court advantage. Rebounding is a big key here with Petrokevich, the Frazee's, and Feagin the ones to make it happen.

[thesportscritic]

We also have speed up and down the floor. If we play our game which is transition at every opportunity we should wear them down in the late stages of the game. Our speed is going to allow us to crash the boards even better than last season.

[BJWilliams]

I hope KP can follow up on her BSC Player of the Week honor with a couple more big games

[bigsmooth]

this will be a tough matchup. if i am correct HPU beat us last year. i am anxious to see how the lady play without megan on the road. GO LADY FLAMES.

[givemethemic]

Big game tonight fellows... we have to get back on D that is HP's bread and butter....

[bigsmooth]

we are down 57-48 with 3:00 left. i knew this would be a tough one.

[Sly Fox]

Its not over yet. But yeah, this one was obviously a tough matchup for us coming in.

[bigsmooth]

64-55 FINAL. lady flames drop 1st big south game of the year. it sounded like we had a good group of fans in high point.

[Sly Fox]

HPU remains the only Big South team to beat us in forever. Tough loss on the road. But HPU will have to come to Vines later on down the road.

[thesportscritic]

When you don't defend you lose. We didn't play defense and we definitely deserve to lose tonight.

[krh44]

Tough loss. Hopefully they can rebound from this. Radford is going to be strong opponent as well.

[ATrain]

Don't we have Birmingham-Southern before Radford? Anyway, HPU is also a top 100 RPI team, so this loss shouldn't hurt us too much in seeding if we win out and take care of business in the conference tourney...also, if by some fluke we win out and lose in the tourney, a WNIT bid is definitely not out of the question...and we could go deep in that.

[thesportscritic]

Our post players played really bad tonight. They had easy shots in the lane and missed them High Point doesn't have a shot blocker whatsoever. They were the better team tonight but I hope this bad loss will motivate the team. I guess we will see what happens on Saturday afternoon.

[Chris Lang]

Good crowd? There are as many people here now for an intramural game as there was for the women's game. 537 is not a good crowd for a battle for first place.

[fsn32]

Good crowd? There are as many people here now for an intramural game as there was for the women's game. 537 is not a good crowd for a battle for first place.

I'm guessing they were going by sound and since our mics are in front of the lu section it probably came through clearly. Not a bad crowd from l-burg for a church night... but hp didn't draw well for a big game. Although I was impressed by hp's marketing staff.

As far as the game, if we hit bunnies and defend the three, we win. Simple as that. Otherwise we played hard and showed some emotion just too little too late.

[bigsmooth]

YES...BY THE SOUND OF THE MIKES IT WAS A GOOD LU CROWD. anyway everyone needs to focus on this season game by game instead of looking at the BSC tournamanet and the NCAA or WNIT. this is certainly a different and much younger team, and the games will be much closer. from listening to the game it sounds like we need to be more focused, and play better D. we have dominated for so long, and for the most part it has been easy. im looking forward to see how this young group battles without megan, and who will be the go to player to lead us.

[Sly Fox]

Don't you wish editors would do their job, Chris? Obviously our setbacks to BCS schools is much more frequent than BSC schools.

LU women suffer rare BCS setback

By Chris Lang
Lynchburg News & Advance
January 26, 2006

HIGH POINT, N.C. - Liberty couldn't even fool High Point once. Yet stunningly, the Flames tried the same play three straight times, only to watch it end in the same disastrous fashion each time Wednesday night.

Forward Karolina Piotrkiewicz would flash to the middle, demanding a touch. Each time, a different Panther was there to step in front and pick the entry pass cleanly. High Point turned the interceptions into five transition points, capping a 15-0 second-half run. The Panthers won 64-55, and for the first time in recent memory, the Flames found themselves in an uncomfortable spot: looking up at someone in the Big South standings.

High Point improved to 4-0 in conference games and won its second straight against the Flames. UNC Greensboro was the last to pull that trick, sweeping the regular-season series with the Flames in 1996-97.

"I wouldn't say they have our number at all," said guard Allyson Fasnacht, who led Liberty with 12 points. "The game last year was kind of a fluke. We didn't play our game and they came into our house and beat us. I just don't think we came in as focused as we needed to tonight."

The turnover fiasco was just one of several strange mental lapses for the Flames (11-5, 3-1). There were the two possessions when High Point's Katie Ralls found herself inexplicably open underneath the basket and finished with easy layups. There was the ugly first half in which Liberty shot 9-for-36.

And there was another long scoring drought. While High Point was running off 15 straight points, Liberty went 5:06 without scoring. An Allyson Fasnacht free throw snapped the dry spell, but the Flames trailed 53-43 after leading 42-38.

Liberty survived an 8?-minute drought Saturday against Winthrop. But that was at home against a young Eagles team trying to scrap its way to respectability.

High Point, on the other hand, is a senior-laden bunch hungry to end Liberty's nine-year run at the top of the conference standings.

"Just to win with such a good group of girls at our place against such a good team, you just can't explain (how good it feels)," said High Point forward Katie O'Dell, the preseason Big South player of the year who had 17 points and 6 rebounds.

Leslie Cook, who set single-season records for 3-pointers made twice at Charlotte before transferring to HPU, added 17 points and hit 5 of 12 3-pointers.

Still, the Flames managed to scrap back within five points after Fasnacht buried a 17-footer with 1:32 left. They played solid defense and forced O'Dell to miss a 3-pointer, but the long rebound went back to Ralls, who was fouled and hit two free throws to push the lead back to seven with 39 seconds left.

It was a telling board on a night when the Flames had 12 more offensive rebounds yet had two less second-chance points than the Panthers (13-4 overall). High Point simply did more with its second chances.

The Flames again struggled with missed layups. Piotrkiewicz shot 3-for-10. Roli-Ann Nikagbatse was 1-for-13.

"The defense didn't close out like we should have," Liberty coach Carey Green said. "Our offense execution wasn't there and we shot poorly. ? The right people need to take the right shots. We had some poor shot selection (during High Point's 15-0 run)."

The game represented a battle of differing strengths, and only High Point managed to exploit its. The Panthers, while they never got the flow of the game up to their preferred speed (i.e. really fast), took advantage of their opportunities to push the pace when creating turnovers. The Panthers scored 28 points off 20 Liberty turnovers.

"We knew we needed to step up the defense," O'Dell said. "Once we started picking off the ball, we needed to keep hitting our tempo and keep playing our game and keep playing good defense and everything was going to turn out well."

The teams will meet again Feb. 18 at Vines Center, and Green admits his team had the look of a young team "that needs to grow up, and fast." If the Flames don't, High Point could have a shot at being the first team since Charleston Southern in the mid-1990s to beat the Flames three straight times.

The implications would be much larger than that, though. If the Panthers pull the season sweep, the Big South tournament championship game would likely be back here at the Millis Convocation Center.

"This is probably a booster for High Point," Green said.

"And everybody else in the conference."

http://newsadvance.com/servlet/Satellit ... th=!sports

[PAmedic]

Second Half Run Propels High Point Past Lady Flames

January 25, 2006 · High Point, N.C.

The High Point Lady Panthers used a 15-point run to overcome a four-point deficit and then held on down the stretch to defeat the Liberty Lady Flames, 64-55, in a meeting between the two Big South unbeaten teams, Wednesday night, at the Millis Center.

With the win, High Point remains unbeaten in conference play with a 4-0 mark, while running its overall record to 13-4, while Liberty drops to 3-1 in the Big South and 11-5 overall.

Liberty jumped out quickly on the evening as Courtney Watkins (So., G, Bristol Tenn.) netted a three-pointer from the right side of the arc and Allyson Fasnacht (So., G, Salem, Va.) added two free throws to put the Lady Flames up, 5-0, in the game’s opening minutes.

The Panthers would then take the lead with an eight-point run capped off by a Leslie Cook three-pointer for a 8-5 lead at the 15:04 mark, only to see the Lady Flames once again go in front on a jumper by Roli-Ann Nikabatske (So., F, Berlin, Germany), 11-9 at 12:25 of the first half.

The teams found baskets at a premium the rest of the way in a tightly-played half. The score would be knotted four times in the period before Cook made her second three-pointer of the half to put High Point up at 4:13 of the first half, 21-18. Liberty’s Watkins then cut the lead to 27-24 with two free throws right before intermission.

The Lady Flames shot 25 percent from the floor in the first period on 9-36 shooting, while the Panthers had their own difficulties shooting 27.6 percent on 8-29 shooting.

In the second half, Liberty scored the first seven points of the half to regain the lead 31-27 as Moriah Frazee (Fr., F, Xenia, Ohio) capped off the run with a old fashioned three-point play three minutes in.

The teams then traded baskets and leads until the 12:05 mark of the half when the Panthers trailing 42-38 would go on a 15-0 run over the next five minutes to take a 53-42 advantage. Cook capped the run for High Point with her fifth three-pointer of the night with 7:12 left to play and the Panther advantage would hit 13 at 6:12, 56-43, when Katie O’Dell netted her third basket of the half from behind the arc.

The Lady Flames then battled back, cutting the Panthers lead to 60-55 with 1:52 left as Watkins netted a three-pointer and Fasnacht followed with a jumper. However, the Panthers Katie Ralls sank all four of her free throws in the game’s last 40 seconds to ice the victory for High Point.

On the night, Liberty was led by Fasnacht who netted 12 points and tied for the game-high in rebounds with seven. Watkins followed with 10 points while also grabbing seven boards. The Panthers O’Dell and Cook tied for game-high honors in points with 17 to lead the Panthers, while O’Dell and Caitlin Thys had six rebounds each for High Point.

Liberty continues on the road as they travel to Birmingham, Ala. to square off with the Birmingham-Southern Panthers on Saturday. Game time is set for 3 p.m.

[TIMSCAR20]

I think it was back on the old board but I said that it would be very very hard to run the table and we should applaude any team in any conference that can pull that off and not expect it to happen again. Someone said that if we don't come to play we deserve to lose or something along those lines. My response was that the other team is preparing to win too and are division 1 players and that sometimes the ball doesn't bounce your way even when you are playing hard and playing well. Our women's team will be fine but we need to have a more realistic perspective and not just expect to win every night by 50 points. I am still praying for Megan and her psychological and emotional healing because that can be the most difficult part of coming back from a serious injury. Again, I am not down on the women's team I just want folks to realize that what they accomplished last year should not be taken for granted (both regular season and post season). Everyone talks seedings and winning tournament games. The truth is the coaches and players look at it one game at a time and no one in that office is thinking about seedings until they get to the tournament. We as fans and alumni are free to talk about it though

[Chris Lang]

Smooth, you were right, there was a decent little Liberty contingent there. I guess I was expressing my disgust with a supposed "big-game atmosphere." It just wasn't there. And Sly, I can only hope the mispelling in the headline was limited to the web site. I hope at least ...

FSN32's point was dead on. Nothing to get terribly worried about yet. High Point's a pretty decent team. I was impressed with O'Dell, Sellars and Cook, who was a nice midseason pickup for them. Liberty has to get better at finishing around the basket, especially KP and the remaining triplets. The 3s aren't even as much of a concern. But the blown bunnies were worrisome.

[jcmanson]

How could anyone be upset of a loss? With Meagan I believe our goals should have been to run the table in the BS, but without her I think our goal should be to finish #1 in the conference. With all the talent we lost from last year, and no seniors I think with that being the goal this program is in good hands for the forseeable future.