JOHNSON CITY, Tenn. (Jan. 10, 2023) – The ETSU women's basketball team will open Southern Conference play on Thursday when it welcomes Samford to Brooks Gym. Tip-off between the Buccaneers and Bulldogs is set for 7 p.m.
  
GAME INFO
DATE: Thursday, January 11
TIME: 7 p.m. 
LOCATION: Johnson City, Tenn. (Brooks Gym)
TEAMS: Samford at ETSU
LIVE VIDEO: ESPN+
LIVE STATS:  Statbroadcast
RADIO: WXSM-AM 640 
TWITTER: @ETSU_WBB
GAME SPONSOR: Brightridge
PROMOTION: First 200 fans will receive a Faithful for Forty t-shirt
 
ABOUT THE BUCS

• ETSU finished out non-conference play with a 65-53 win over Coker on December 30. With that victory, the Bucs improved to 11-4 on the season. Additionally, the 11 non-conference wins by ETSU are tied for the second-most in the history of the program.
• The Bucs will look to build upon a 7-1 start to their home schedule this week with a pair of home games vs. Samford and Mercer. Among SoCon teams, only UNC Greensboro (9-0) has a better record than the Bucs do at home.
• Defense continues to be the recipe for success for ETSU as it ranks 14^th nationally in scoring defense allowing 53.3 points per game. The Bucs have held two teams under 40 points (Norfolk State and Campbell) and four others under 50 points (Lafayette, Radford, Lees-McRae, Gardner-Webb). Overall, when ETSU holds opposing teams to 56 points or fewer, it is 11-0 on the season.
• In the win over Coker, Kendall Folley paced the Bucs with 16 points on a 6-for-12 outing from the field. The 16-point outburst was Folley's most points in a game since she scored 17 at Presbyterian in mid-November. Looking ahead to the matchup with Samford, Folley scored a career-high 28 points in a game against the Bulldogs last February.
• Another Buccaneer that had a stellar outing against the Cobras was Meghan Downing. Downing notched a double-double with 10 points and 12 rebounds to go with five blocks. The five blocks by Downing were tied for the second-most ever by a Buc in a single game trailing only Kiya Verdell's seven blocks vs. Davidson in 2002.
• ETSU will be looking to begin 1-0 in conference play for the first time since the 2017-18 season when it downed Western Carolina, 66-50. Thursday's game will mark the first time that the Bucs and Bulldogs have matched up in a conference opener.
• A couple of Bucs are nearing milestones as the calendar turns to 2024. First, Breanne Beatty needs to score just 11 more points to reach 1,000 career points. Additionally, Courtney Moore is just 14 3-pointers away from 150 in her career. Moore, who has made 136 threes as a Buc, has a chance to break into the top five in 3-pointers made in ETSU history. Jennifer Cooke (1988-91) currently ranks fifth with 164 made 3-pointers.

 
ABOUT SAMFORD

• Samford enters SoCon play with an 8-7 record.
• Most of the Bulldogs' success this season has come at home as they are 7-1 on their own floor compared to a 1-6 mark in road/neutral site contests in 2023-24.
• The strength of Samford this season has been its defense. As a team, Samford ranks third in the SoCon and 47^th nationally in 3-point field goal percentage defense (26.7). The Bulldogs are also second in the league in blocks per game (4.3) trailing only UNC Greensboro (4.4).
• Samford has the conference's leading shot blocker in Emily Bowman. Bowman has blocked 43 shots on the season, which ranks eighth in the country. She also ranks 10^th in the nation in blocks per game (2.87).
• ETSU and Samford have met a total of 21 times over the years with the first meeting occurring in 2007. The Bucs went 2-1 against the Bulldogs last season, including a 63-47 win in the SoCon Tournament. Samford knocked off ETSU in Brooks Gym last January, 68-58. The Bucs are 5-3 all-time against Samford in games played in Johnson City but the Bulldogs hold the overall edge in the series, 11-10.

UP NEXT 
Following its matchup with Samford, ETSU will welcome Mercer to Johnson City on Saturday. Tip-off for that contest is set for 2 p.m.
 
PURCHASE TICKETS
To purchase season or single game tickets for ETSU women's basketball, visit ETSUTickets.com or call 423-439-3878.
 
For more information on Buccaneer women's basketball, visit ETSUBucs.com and click on the women's basketball tab.