This Friday the ODU women's basketball program will play La Tech on the road in Ruston, La. Ruston is very muh a small college town. The Monarchs are riding a two game winning streak, but have yet to win on the road all season. The Bulldogs are 9-1 at home. This certainly will not be an easy win for the ODU. The Monarchs have won the last two games at La Tech.
Yes we could go on and on about the history of these two programs in the history of women's basketball. In the interest of space, I will just say two teams with over 1,000 wins each will play each other. And very few teams can make that claim.
Louisiana Tech Bulldogs schedule so far. 12-7 (3-3), Home: 9-1, RPI: 191, SOS: 290
Vs Grambling St Record: 7-11 RPI: 253 64-63 W
Vs LSU-Alexandria W 87-47. Non divsion one school, does not count in RPI.
Vs Memphis Record: 7-13 RPI: 162 65-40 W
@ Auburn Record: 9-9 RPI: 108 L 59-75
Southpoint Shootout (Las Vegas, Nev)
Vs Penn St Record: 13-8 RPI: 80 71-59 W
Vs Niagrara Record: 8-11 RPI: 207 67-73 L
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@ Texas Record: 15-3 RPI: 10 54-88 L
Vs Clemson Record: 11-9 RPI: 109 47-55 L
@ AR LIttle Rock Record: 10-8 RPI: 129 58-49 W
VS LA Monroe Record: 2-14 RPI: 332 71-49 W
Vs McNeese St Record: 5-10 RPI: 290 78-62 W
Vs Houston Baptist Record: 2-12 RPI: 322 85-62 W
Vs Alcorn St Record: 6-10 RPI: 272 87-50 W
Vs North Texas Record: 8-7 (2-4) RPI: 219 61-53 W
Vs UTSA Record: 2-14 (1-5) RPI: 313 63-55 W
@ Southern Miss Record: 9-7 (3-2) RPI: 121 50-65 L
@ Marshall Record: 4-12 (0-5) RPI: 328 74-65 W
@ FIU Record: 6-12 (3-2) RPI: 281 54-57 L
@ FAU Record: 9-7 (3-2) RPI: 198 72-86 L
Vs ODU Record: 4-16 (2-4) RPI: 323
The Bulldogs are in the second year of Mr and Mrs Stoehr., co-captian head coaches. Last year they went 18-14 and a first round loss at the WNIT.
"Old Dominion is a little shorthanded on their roster this year from a numbers standpoint," said (La Tech coach Brooke) Stoehr. "They had a coaching turnover during the off-season and had some players graduate and transfer. They are playing well and have won two in a row. We will have to come out and play much better. Our fans have great respect for both of these programs but at the same time don't like them very much. It's your typical rivalry. We have educated our players on those rivalries. We will be ready to go, and hopefully we will have two good crowds."
http://www.latechsports.com/sports/w-bas...18aaa.html
Bulldog's Starting Five
#32 Zhanae Whitney 6'0" F JR 4.7 ppg, 5.2 rpg, 0.5 apg, 53.3 FG%, 73.5 FT%, 18.3 mpg
#34 Alexus Malone 6'0" F RsSR 13.6 ppg, 8.7 rpg, 1.1 apg, 1.9 spg, 51.3 FG%, 33.3 3P%, 71.4 FT%, 27.3 mpg
#03 Kierra Lang 5'9" G SO 1.3 ppg, 2.0 rpg, 3.3 apg, 1.0 spg, 21.4 FG%, 07.1 3P%, 1.000 FT%, 20.1 mpg
#04 Kierra Anthony 5'6" G JR 12.7 ppg, 3.5 rpg, 2.3 apg, 2.2 spg, 39.3 FG%, 21.0 3P%, 80.0 FT%, 25.4 mpg
#24 Taylor Stahly 5'7" G JR 11.1 ppg, 2.1 rpg, 1.5 apg, 42.3 FG%, 41.6 3P%, 96.3 FT%, 28.9 mpg
Alexus Malone is their star player. And when you have the last name of Malone and you go to La Tech the obvious question is she related to Karl Malone? Not that I know of. But her mom was Stacey Johnson who was a two time Kodak All-American at Delta State. She scored 1,886 points in her career. So yes she does come from good basketball roots.
Stahly is a three point threat, shooting almost everything from downtown at over 40%. The team feeds off Malone though. Anthony is a dangerous second option down low for the team. They play about eight player in and out. They do focus on defense as a team.
Inside the Numbers.....
...............LAT....ODU
PPG.......66.7.....55.3
OPPG.....60.2.....65.1
FG%........41.5.....37.5
OFG%.....38.8......41.7
3P%........32.0.....29.4
3PMG.......5.4......5.8
FT%.........69.0.....63.4
FTMPG.....13.8.....10.2
RPG..........38.4.....34.0
OpRPG......34.1.....34.9
APG...........14.7....11.1
TPG...........18.6....15.7
SPG...........9.9.....6.1
BPG..........2.2......2.1
Ast/TO ratio: La Tech: 0.8, ODU 0.7
This might be a close game based on stats. ODU is coming off a two game win streak so they have as confident as they have ever been as a team Can they take that mojo and go on the road and win? Ruston is a tough place, but we have come through in the past. If anything, we know that La Tech fans don't like us...so the crowd is going to be against us 100%. Time to see what ODU is made out of....