Smoky Mountain Today

Riding a five-game South Atlantic Conference winning streak, Carson-Newman hops on the bus and travels to Newberry, a club that has lost five in a row, on Saturday to take on the Wolves at 2 p.m. from Eleazer Arena.

Last season, the Lady Eagles had three different SAC winning streaks of five in a row including the final five of the regular season as the club added four more in the postseason between the SAC Tournament and NCAA Tournament's opening round. The last time the team won six SAC affairs in a row in the regular season was a span of seven straight from Feb. 1-18, 2021.

Powered by a pair of players in the top 10 nationally in free-throw shooting percentage, Campbell Penland (Sevierville, Tenn.) at No. 6 and Braelyn Wykle (Greeneville, Tenn.) at No. 10, C-N is shooting 84 percent as a team in the final four minutes and overtime this year. There have been seven times this year where the club has made at least 80 percent in a game.

When the two teams duel on Saturday, it will be the 53rd clash with Carson-Newman (10-6, 5-2) holding a commanding 35-17 lead behind 12 wins in a row, the longest string for either side in the series, and 16 of the last 18. The last time Newberry (5-10, 1-4) beat Mincey's crew came in the SAC Quarterfinals on March 2, 2016, 85-74 in Eleazer Arena. Eight of the 12 victories have been by double figures as three of single-digit efforts have been at Newberry.

In last year's affair in the Palmetto State, the Orange and Blue trailed by eight going into the fourth quarter before tallying the first six points of the fourth and outscored Newberry 28-16 over the final 10 minutes to secure a 77-73 comeback victory. C-N forced 14 turnovers in the final 10 minutes and finished with 25 points off of giveaways.

Only Mars Hill's seven losses in a row is more than the five by the Wolves as each of the setbacks have come by double figures. The team's last win came on Dec. 10, a 67-58 victory over Catawba. The club is a combined 0-9 in road and neutral games but 5-1 at home. Offensively the team is pretty similar but foes have scored at least 70 points in six of the game games away from home.

Newberry ranks 19th from the bottom nationally in scoring offense with 54.3 points per game being outscored by 10 points per game. The Wolves have scored below 70 points in all but one game, an 80-64 victory over Allen, being held to 50 or fewer six times.

Turnovers have been a big part of the issue averaging 21 per game with eight games of at least 20 winning three of those affairs. The Wolves have the seventh-worst turnover margin in the country at minus-six with 11 of the 15 foes giving it away 15 or fewer times.

While 11 players are posting double-digit minutes on average, only Ericka Wisely is notching double-digit points with 10.8 per game. The senior forward has 10 games with at least 10 but has nine points in her last two going 2-for-11 from the field. For a team averaging five rejections per game, Wisely leads the way with 25 overall.

Payton Cronen started the season with four double-digit scoring efforts in her first five but has gone 10 in a row in single digits. She is scoring five points per game in that stretch as 31 of her 37 made shots have come from long distance ranking fourth in the league by converting at a 40-percent clip.

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