OKLAHOMA CITY – The Mid-America Christian women's basketball team will be hitting the road for the first time this season as the Evangels will travel to Denton, Texas for an exhibition matchup against North Texas on Thursday at 11:30 a.m. before heading to Austin, Texas on Saturday for a 1 p.m. matchup against Huston-Tillotson.
LAST TIME OUT
Mid-America Christian (3-0) picked up its third straight home win to open the regular season on Tuesday night with an 80-71 victory over Oklahoma Christian. The only time the Evangels trailed in the contest was after the Lady Eagles made a three-point shot on the opening possession, but MACU took over with a 6-0 run and never looked back. OC rallied back to tie the score at 57 in the fourth quarter with 8:07 remaining, but MACU was able to expand its lead back to double-digits to pull away down the stretch.
Senior forward Alexis Shannon led the Evangels with a double-double, tallying 30 points and 10 rebounds while Sydney Wycoff turned in a career-best 18 points on 5-of-8 shooting and 4-of-6 from the three-point arc.
SCOUTING THE MEAN GREEN
An NCAA Division I program out of Conference USA, North Texas opened the 2019-20 season with a 95-43 win over Texas Woman's in the Mean Green's first exhibition game of the season. Last year, the Mean Green finished with an 18-16 record and went 7-9 in C-USA play. UNT advanced all the way to the Women's Basketball Invitational before its season came to a close in a 76-59 loss to Appalachian State in the championship tilt.
Senior forward Anisha George will look to lead the Mean Green after pouring in 26 points in the exhibition opener against Texas Woman's. George averaged 10.2 points per game in last year's campaign and North Texas will also be expecting big things out of freshman guard N'Yah Boyd after tallying 17 points against the Pioneers.
HISTORY WITH THE MEAN GREEN
The Evangels will be playing North Texas in an exhibition game for the third straight year, falling in the previous two exhibition contests 86-52 in 2017 and 82-35 in 2018.
SCOUTING THE LADY RAMS
Huston-Tillotson will enter Saturday's contest with a 1-0 record after knocking off MACU's Sooner Athletic Conference rival Langston 80-76 in its season opener. The Red River Athletic Conference program was picked to finish fourth in the league this season after closing out the 2018-19 campaign with an 18-10 record and a 10-8 mark in RRAC play.
A team that features a balanced scoring attack, the Lady Rams will be led by senior guard Kryshona Carter, who averaged 12.4 pts/g a season ago and led the way in HTU's season-opening win at Langston with 16 points. Sophomore guard Ilana Sanford will look to step up the scoring efforts after tallying 13 against the Lady Lions last week as will senior forward Kayla Barber, who matched it with 13 of her own after knocking down 3-of-4 from beyond the arc.
HISTORY WITH THE LADY RAMS
MACU and Huston-Tillotson will be playing each other for the first time during the NAIA era.
ROCKIN' ON THE ROAD
While Mid-America Christian has taken care of business at home, the Evangels have played well on the road under fourth year Head Coach Hannah Moeller. MACU finished last year's campaign with an 8-7 record on the road and have posted a 24-18 (.571) in road contests during Moeller's tenure.
FINDING WAYS TO WIN
Despite getting outshot by Oklahoma Christian in Tuesday night's contest with the Lady Eagles knocking down 51 percent from the floor as opposed to the Evangels' 38.2 percent, MACU was able to take advantage of second chances. Mid-America Christian outrebounded OC by a 44-30 margin on the glass, which included a 19-2 edge in offensive boards. Despite giving up a high shooting percentage, MACU was able to force the Lady Eagles into committing 23 turnovers, their second-highest turnover rate in the last two seasons for Oklahoma Christian.
