The ETSU women’s basketball team took on Mercer University on Feb. 22 at home in Brooks Gym and walked away with a 56-54 win against the bears. The Bucs now have a 9-19 overall record and a 4-9 conference record.
Starting off, the Bucs struggled to catch up ending halftime with a 28-16 score. The Blue and Gold started to make a comeback boosting the score 32-41 at the end of the third quarter. The Bucs came out with 24 points scored in the fourth quarter bringing the score to 56-54.
“Resilience, those kids never gave up,” said assistant coach Ashley Houts. “We didn’t have the best first half, and we didn’t have a great third quarter. I guess statistically it was a low scoring game and as the minutes were ticking in the fourth quarter we tried to portray the look and send the message and keep encouraging them.”
Sophomore Amaya Adams (Kansas City, Missouri) had a career-high of 13 points.
“I worked towards this by building confidence and knowing my team trusts me to knock down the open shot or attack,” said Adams. “Just coming in early before practice and doing layups.”
The Bucs also held senior night during the day’s competition where they got to honor the four seniors: Arielle Harvey (Atlanta, Georgia), Jada Craig (Winston-Salem, North Carolina), Taisha Murphy (Clayton, North Carolina) and Anajae Stephney (Knoxville, Tennessee).
“I would like the seniors to know that they are appreciated more than they think and that it will be really different without them next year,” said Adams.
The Bucs now hold the sixth seed in the Southern Conference. The tournament begins March 5 in Asheville, North Carolina.
The team will play UT Chattanooga on Feb. 29 in Chattanooga, Tennessee.
