January 4, 2011

UNCG (7-5, 4-0 SoCon) vs. Georgia Southern (5-9, 2-3 SoCon), Jan. 5,
7 p.m., Fleming Gym

LiveStats: UNCGSpartans.com
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UNCG vs. Georgia Southern game notes

Storylines

• Alone atop the league standings, UNCG will look for its second-ever 5-0 Southern Conference start when it hosts Georgia Southern on Wednesday.

• With wins in five straight games and seven of their last nine, the Spartans are one of the hottest teams in the SoCon. UNCG opened the season 0-3 before turning things around. At 4-0 in league play thus far, UNCG is trying for its first 5-0 start since the 2000-01 campaign. UNCG is also looking for its first six-game winning streak since Feb. 3-19, 2007.

• UNCG's current five-game winning streak is its longest since taking five straight from Dec. 2-21, 2008.

• Wednesday's contest will be UNCG's third in a stretch of five games in 11 days. The brutal stretch began Dec. 31 at Davidson and continued Monday at Western. The Spartans will be back on the road this weekend at Chattanooga on Saturday and Samford on Monday.

• UNCG's 56-50 win at Western Carolina on Monday was coach Lynne Agee's 550th at UNCG. She is now 550-300 in 30 seasons at the helm for the Spartans. Overall, she is 596-323 in her 33-year career and needs just four more wins to become just the 12th active coach to reach 600 wins. Agee is 12th among active coaches in terms of wins and is 20th among Div. I coaches all-time.

• UNCG leads the series with Georgia Southern by a narrow margin, 18-14. The teams have split in each of the last two seasons.

• The Eagles took a 63-55 win over UNCG in the last meeting between the squads, on Jan. 25, 2010, in Greensboro. The Spartans' Kendra Smith scored a career-high 23 points and Brey Dorsett matched her career high with 11 in her first career start, but GSU got 17 points from Carolyn Whitney and 10 from Jessica Geiger and a 22-3 first-half run to pick up the win.

• The Spartans got a game-high 14 points from Amanda Leigh and 11 from Monique Floyd to drop Western Carolina on Monday, 56-50. The Spartans, who led by as many as 14, saw the Catamounts cut it to three in the second half but held on for win.

• Leigh leads the Spartans in scoring with 13.8 points per game, while Floyd is just behind her at 13.5. Leigh grabs a team-best 1.8 steals per game and Floyd leads the SoCon with a 2.0:1 assist-to-turnover ratio and averages 3.6 assists per game. Freshman Janae' Stevenson leads the Spartans with 6.4 rebounds per game.

• Georgia Southern enters Wednesday's contest with a 5-9 overall mark and a 2-3 SoCon record. The Lady Eagles have been a streaky team so far this season, opening 1-1 before dropping seven straight. GSU rebounded with four straight wins before falling at Elon on Monday.

• The Lady Eagles opened SoCon play with losses at Wofford and Chattanooga in early December. In a rare scheduling quirk, GSU's next league game was at home against Chattanooga two weeks later, with the Lady Eagles grabbing an overtime win over the 11-time defending regular-season SoCon champs. A win over Samford followed before the loss at Elon.

• UNCG and GSU have two common opponents so far this season in Wofford and High Point. The Spartans topped Wofford, which beat GSU, but the Lady Eagles downed High Point, which drilled UNCG on Dec. 7, 79-60.

• The Lady Eagles are just 1-6 on the road so far this season. The lone road win came at Stetson on Dec. 14 to kick off the four-game winning streak.

• In Monday's 77-61 loss at Elon, sophomore Meredyth Frye scored a career-high 24 points but the Phoenix outrebounded the Eagles 43-28 and finished the first half on a 10-0 run to take a lead it would not surrender.

• Jamie Navarro leads GSU with 13.6 points per game, while Frye is second at 11.1 points per contest. Frye and Krista Tate share the team rebounding lead at 5.6 per game, with Tate just a fraction ahead of Frye with 79 total rebounds to Frye's 78. Tate dishes off a team-best 2.6 assists per game and Frye leads the team with 1.5 steals per game.

• The Lady Eagles are second in the SoCon in free throw percentage (.751) and 3-point percentage (.376). UNCG is 10th in both categories (.631 free throw percentage, .301 3-point percentage).

- UNCG -