Coach Marty Rowe and his Lady Flames boarded the bus and headed for West Tennessee on Thursday morning for their final regular-season road trip. Lee University (18-8, 16-6) will face sixth-ranked and rival Union University (26-2, 20-2) on Thursday evening (5:30 p.m., CST) and then move onto Memphis and battle Christian Brothers on Saturday (1 p.m. CST).
“We have not quite locked up the third seed yet,” said Coach Rowe as he eyed the schedule for all the GSC teams. “I believe we will need to win one more game (to lockup the seed).”
The Lady Flames are assured of hosting the first-round game of the GSC tournament on Tuesday and it is only a matter of a third-or-fourth seed.
Auburn University at Montgomery and Lee are tied in the standings. If they finish that way on Saturday evening, the Lady Flames hold the tiebreaker.
As far as who Lee might face in the tournament opener, it is yet to be decided. A logjam finds five teams still in the hunt according to GSC officials and four are fighting for positions. Rowe did take a brief look at the regional rankings. “The regional rankings are important, but we can’t think about those too much, those things take care of themselves if we play well on the court,” he explained.
First there is the rematch with Union, the Lady Bulldogs scored five points in the final 1:29 of the first meeting on Jan. 13 and tied the game at 82 and sent the contest into overtime. In the extra five minutes Union outscored the Lady Flames 16-13 to claim the hard fought 98-95 win.
The Lady Bulldogs set two records in posting victory; most free throws taken in a game 57 and most free throws made in a game 44. On its home court Lee marched to the line 29 times and converted 18. Union outscored the Lady Flames by 26 points on charity points. Lee also had six players, including Mallory Hampton foul out of the game.
It is always a big game when the Lady Flames and Lady Bulldogs tangle, but you will not see either talking about Thursday’s game, instead they will be pointing toward post season play. In the first NCAA regional rankings that were posted on Wednesday, the Lady Flames were ranked #6 and Union was #2 in the south region. The top eight teams will make the NCAA tournament.
“This is the time of year that you want to be playing your best basketball and we have been doing that over the last few weeks, which is really what we are looking to do this week as well. We know it is a tough trip, but it is great preparation for postseason,” the Lee coach said.
“Having a week off this time of year is unusual but the team has handled it well. We have had great energy in practice and getting some rest for people down the stretch has hopefully paid off,” he added. “This group made a commitment to get better after the AUM loss, defending with purpose and urgency is something we have to continue doing if we want to be successful.”