The Longwood women’s basketball team defeated the UNC Asheville Bulldogs in the quarterfinals of the Big South tournament 72-58 on March 5. On a night where they didn’t shoot particularly well, the Lancers still forced 19 turnovers, stole the ball 13 times and held their opponents to 28% from the floor.
Longwood ran out to an early lead as they held the sixth-seeded Bulldogs to zero points through the first five minutes. Longwood and Asheville played out the rest of the first quarter fairly evenly as the Lancers led 15-7 after one frame.
Freshman guard Jesstynie Scott shined in the second quarter with two fast-break steals and lay-ins. Graduate guard Malea Brown carried the rest of the load offensively, leading the Lancers with 10 points as they held a 32-22 lead going into the break. UNC Asheville’s Nia Green led the Bulldogs with 10 of her own. The Lancers kept the Bulldogs shooting just 25% from the floor in the first half.
Longwood raced out to a run in the middle of the third quarter, stretching the lead out to 16 points and prompting a UNC Asheville timeout. The Bulldogs forced multiple turnovers and got the lead down to just five points after going on an 11-0 run. The Lancers couldn’t pull away until they sank crucial free-throws in the fourth quarter.
Junior forward Frances Ulysse shot 6-6 from the free throw line and finished with 16 points. Scott ended the game with 17 points and five steals, while Brown also snatched five steals of her own. The Lancers salted away the final few seconds and won 72-58. “I was really pleased with the effort down the stretch,” said Longwood head coach Erika Lang-Montgomery. “I thought our players were gritty and very resilient.
The Lancers never trailed the Bulldogs, despite having multiple lapses on the offensive end. Longwood had 20 turnovers of their own which led to 18 points in the other direction. Green of UNC Asheville led all scorers with 21 points. “They have made leaps and bounds since last season,” Lang-Montgomery said of UNC Asheville. “That didn’t feel like we were playing a sixth seed, that’s a very good basketball team we just beat.”
Junior forward Otaifo Esenabhalu and Ulysse both secured double-doubles again as they continued to dominate when on the court at the same time. “Otaifo [Esenabhalu] does her job at an elite level,” Lang-Montgomery said. “She’s a rebounding machine…but Frances [Ulysse] as well. [Both of] them together are a formidable pair.”
Scott’s 17 points were the second-most she has scored against Big South opponents all season. She hit two of Longwood’s total of four converted threes in the game. “I just woke up feeling great,” said Scott. “I definitely listened to my gospel music…my teammates, they definitely helped me, pushed me in practice, especially my coaches.”
Next up for the Lancers is a rematch of the previous season’s Big South semifinals as they’ll face Radford on Saturday, March 7 at 8:30 p.m. on ESPN+. “It’s going to be a heavyweight matchup,” Lang-Montgomery said. “It’s crazy that we have two teams from Virginia having to come all the way to Tennessee to play each other…it’s going to be a battle, [Radford] has a lot of pieces that we’ve got to work hard to contain.”
