Dec. 16, 2003
– Game No. 8: Old Dominion
Georgia Tech (6-1) vs. Old Dominion (5-3)
* December 18, 2003 * 2 p.m. * Ted Constant Convocation Center * Norfolk, Va.
WREK-FM 91.1 in Atlanta * ESPN Radio 1310 in Norfolk
Tech Travels to ODU and Princeton
The Georgia Tech women’s basketball team begins its second five-day trip of the season in Norfolk, Va., when it faces Old Dominion in a game that will tip-off at 2 p.m. on Thursday, December 18. Following the game, the Jackets will travel north to Princeton for a game set to begin at 1 p.m. the following Sunday. The Yellow Jackets enter the contest with ODU owning a 6-1 record on the season, while the Lady Monarchs stand at 5-3. Georgia Tech will be broadcasting the game on WREK-Radio, 91.1 FM in Atlanta, and online at www.wrek.or while the Old Dominion broadcast can be heard in Norfolk on ESPN Radio 1310.
Series Notes
The Yellow Jackets and Lady Monarchs will be facing each other for the first time in history on Thursday afternoon, with Tech placing its undefeated record versus Colonial Athletic Association opponents on the line. The Jackets met ODU conference opponent James Madison earlier this year in the opening game of the Paradise Jam in St. Thomas, winning 60-53, to improve their record to 9-0 vs. the CAA. While Tech has faced just six of the 10 CAA teams prior to today’s game, the same is not true for ODU against the Atlantic Coast Conference. Tech is the only team in the ACC that Old Dominion has yet to face, as the Lady Monarchs own a 59-52 all-time record against the conference. ODU last faced an ACC opponent earlier in December, defeating North Carolina on its home court, 73-68. The only schools in the league that ODU does not have a winning record against are Duke (4-5), Maryland (8-10) and NC State (14-18). Following Thursday’s game, the Jackets will face their final CAA opponent when they host the Atlanta Marriott Northwest Holiday Invitational during the holidays. Tech hosts William and Mary in first round action on December 30, with the winner moving on to the championship game the following day.
While Tech carries the undefeated CAA record into Norfolk, Va., the Jackets have had an easier time, as five of those games were held at Tech’s Alexander Memorial Coliseum. Three contests were held at neutral sites (including the game vs. JMU this year), while just one game has been held on a CAA opponents’ home court.
Last Time Out for Tech
The Yellow Jackets put together their most complete game of the season against UCF, defeating the Golden Knights 70-48 at Alexander Memorial Coliseum. Senior Fallon Stokes again led the Jackets in scoring with 20 points on an afternoon when every Tech player saw the floor and ten of them had ten or more minutes of playing time. She added four rebounds, three assists and two steals in the contest while shooting 70% from the field and 6-of-7 from the charity stripe. Freshman Stephanie Higgs had a breakout game for the Jackets. She scored the first points of her career in the first half and then went on a tear in the second, scoring nine over the last five minutes of the game for a total of 13 in 16 minutes. Sophomore Kasha Terry earned her first start of the year and made the most of it, scoring six points, pulling down nine rebounds and blocking two shots. The Jackets pounded the boards as well, pulling down 43 rebounds, including 20 on the offensive end of the court, as compared to UCF’s 23. The Golden Knights were only able to retrieve six offensive rebounds in the game. Tech had 10 steals in the game, as compared to UCF’s four, and the Golden Knights turned the ball over five more times than the Jackets. Looking at Old Dominion
ODU overcame a one-point half time deficit to defeat Florida International 77-66 at home on Monday night and push the Lady Monarchs record to 5-3 on the season and 4-0 on their home court at the Ted Constant Convocation Center. Monique Coker had a double-double for Old Dominion, her fifth of the season, scoring 17 points while retrieving a season-high of 17 rebounds while Shareese Grant led the Monarch scorers with 19 points in the contest. ODU’s only losses this season have come to ranked opponents Virginia Tech (No. 23), Auburn (No. 22) and Colorado (No. 20). The Lady Monarchs have gone 4-1 since dropping their first two games of the season to Colorado and the Tigers in the WBCA Classic, including two wins over ranked opponents Penn State (No. 7) and North Carolina (No. 12). These two schools only losses on the season came at the hands of the Lady Monarchs by scores of 75-68 (PSU) and 73-68 (UNC).
Lady Monarchs Threats: Monique Coker: 16.6 ppg, 9.4 rpg, 19 assists, 19 steals, 17 blocks, 57% field goal percentage; 44% from beyond the arc; Shareese Grant: 16.5 ppg, 22 assists, 15 steals, 51% field goal percentage, 85% from the free-throw line; Myriah Spence: 11.1 ppg, 5.3 rpg, 16 assists, 90% free-throw shooter; Max Nhassengo: 10.1 ppg, 4.4 rpg, 22 assists, 14 steals.
Yellow Jacket Injury Update
Georgia Tech senior guard Nina B?rlin has been sidelined indefinitely as she continues to recover from her second knee surgery in two years to repair a torn ACL. B?rlin missed the final 12 games of the 2002 season with a torn ligament in the same left knee and suffered the second tear just two minutes into the season-opener with Charlotte in November, 2002. She underwent a successful surgery and continues to recover at this time.
Tech Among ACC Leaders
With the Georgia Tech senior starters stepping up, Georgia Tech ranks at or near the top in several individual categories and is moving up in the team standings as the year progresses. Fallon Stokes and Alex Stewart are leading the way, with the rest of the Yellow Jackets not far behind. Stokes, a forward from Atlanta, ranks at the top of the scoring category with an average of 20.3 points per contest. She also ranks in the top fifteen in the three rebounding categories, offensive (14th, 2.14 pg), defensive (4th, 5.0 pg) and total rebounds (8th, 7.1 pg).
The Norcross native Stewart joins Stokes as one of the top scorers in the ACC, as she stands 15th with an average of 12.0 points per game. She also stands in the top 10 in several other categories however, as she’s fourth in assists per game (5.0), sixth in steals per contest (2.29) and three-point field goal percentage (.421) and seventh in assist/turnover ratio (1.75). She also stands 13th in field goal percentage (.510), tied for 13th in three-pointers per game (1.14), tied for 14th in offensive rebounds (2.14 pg), 15th in free-throw percentage (.706) and 19th in total rebounding (5.3 pg).
Senior Megan Isom, a shooting guard from Decatur, stayed near the top of the league in the three-point stats, holding tied for fifth with 13 threes made this season and standing 14th with a .325 average from beyond the three-point arc.
Rounding out the top-17 for the Jackets in multiple conference categories are Jessica Williams, April Johnson and Kasha Terry. Terry currently stands second in the ACC in blocks per game, with 2.0, while Williams is 17th on the boards with an average of 5.4 rebounds per game and stands tied for 14th with her teammates Stokes and Stewart with 2.14 offensive boards per game. In the free-throw percentage category, Harpring is tied for first with Duke’s Iciss Tillis, owning a perfect mark from the charity stripe, but does not rank in the conference stats due to lack of attempts. Johnson has moved up to sixth in the standings, however, as she has an .833 average from the line.
She’s Not New on the Block
Yellow Jacket sophomore Kasha Terry played in 30 games in the 2002-03 season, and recorded 40 blocks along the way, establishing herself as a solid shot blocker within the ACC by averaging 1.3 per game. This season, the Douglasville, Ga., native has stepped it up even more, averaging 2.0 blocks per contest, including two games with three or more blocks recorded. She tied a career high of four blocks, set against Maryland last season, against Georgia State in early December Terry is currently second in the Atlantic Coast Conference in blocks per game.
The Lil’ Thief Gives Back
While Georgia Tech senior point guard Alex Stewart stands second on the team in scoring, she leads the team in assists, with 35 on the season and an average of five per game. Her 35 helpers is more than one-third of Tech’s total assists on the season, as the Yellow Jackets have a total of 86 on the year. Stewart had a season-high of nine assists against Southwest Missouri State at the Paradise Jam in St. Thomas over the Thanksgiving holidays and dished out seven against West Virginia in the same tournament a day earlier. The Norcross, Ga., native also leads the team with 16 steals for the season, which is almost 1/3 of the Jackets’ 2003-04 total of 50. She stole a season-high four against Davidson in the Jackets’ first home game of the season and had three steals against both James Madison (in game one of the Paradise Jam) and Georgia State. As of Monday, she stands fourth in the ACC in assists and sixth in steals. For her career, Stewart has 375 helpers and 151 swipes to her credit.
The Magic Number is 70
While Georgia Tech is led by scorers Fallon Stokes and Alex Stewart, a huge part of the success of the Yellow Jackets has come at the other end of the court. Through the first six games, Tech has kept five of its opponents under 70 points, with two of those being held to under 60. In those five games, Georgia Tech is a perfect 5-0, with the closest game being a 69-64 contest against Georgia State in early December. The lowest any team has scored this season against the Jackets is 48 points by UCF on December 14. Tech won that game by 22 points. A year ago, Tech held 20 opponents under 70 points, with the Jackets’ winning 17 of those contests.
Stokes Having a “Grand” Senior Year
Senior Fallon Stokes was expected to step in and pick up the slack when Sonja Mallory left due to eligibility, and she hasn’t disappointed. Through six games this season, Stokes is averaging 20.3 points and 7.1 rebounds per game, both of which far exceed her career averages. Coming into the 2003-04 season, she was averaging 10.1 points per game while pulling down 4.9 rebounds per contest. She has had a season-high of 25 points on two occasions this season, with the most recent one coming against cross-town rival Georgia State. With a little over 17 minutes left in that game, Stokes also set a career mark, becoming just the 19th player in Georgia Tech history to score 1,000 points in their career. She currently has 1,028 points during her four years at Tech.
Stewart Looking For Milestones
Yellow Jackets senior guard Alex Stewart keeps moving up the Georgia Tech career charts with a stellar senior campaign. With 35 assists already this season, Stewart brings her career total to 375, which is now the fourth-highest career average in Tech history. She is just 27 assists away from Tory Ehle, who has 402 behind Tiffany Martin (559) and Georgia Tech Hall of Famer, Ida Neal, who had 508. Martin stills stands sixth in the ACC record books while Neal is 15th.
When she suits up for today’s game, Stewart will be playing in the 100th game of her career at Georgia Tech. She is on pace to break the Tech career mark of 119 games, set by Karen Lounsbury in 1992, in the last game of the regular season against Wake Forest.
“Ice” Breaks 100
Tech senior Megan Isom hit three from beyond the three-point arc against Georgia State to raise her career total to 101 made three-pointers, which tied her for fourth on Tech’s career list. She now has 101 threes in her career, placing her tied for fourth place on the career list behind Danielle Donehew (241), Karen Lounsbury (205) and Carla Munnion, with 165. Isom also stands fourth in Tech history in three-point field goals attempted, with 301.
