The Georgia Southern Lady Eagles are off to an impressive 13-4 start to the season and are 6-1 in conference play after a 66-55 road victory Wednesday night over Georgia State.
The Eagles ran their home record to 9-1 with a 77-60 win over ODU Saturday afternoon, which marked their 8th straight win at “The Hill.”
“I always have high expectations so it’s tough to say we have exceeded expectations, but I am proud of how we are playing,” said coach Hana Haden. “With only four returning players and 11 newcomers they have come together quickly. We started 1-3 against some tough teams and they really showed their toughness by how they responded to that going 11-1 since then.”
Bringing in 11 newcomers, there was a bit of an unknown to how the players would mesh together, but Haden felt the coaching staff did their due diligence in order to put together a cohesive team.
“There is some luck involved in this kind of a process, but we really feel we vetted the players we were bringing in,” Haden said. “We asked questions and shared things about our program expectations that would show us how they would fit in. Among those questions was how they felt about doing community service which is very important to us and that helped vet out some issues we may have with character.
The Eagles are currently led in scoring by Destiny Garrett at 15 points per game, followed closely behind by Kishya Anderson at 14.1 ppg. McKenna Eddings is averaging 13.2 ppg and 7.1 rebounds per contest and Shanti Simmons comes in at 11.1 ppg.
Eddings is one of the Eagles returning players and felt during the off-season that the team was heading in the right direction to do special things this year.
“I feel like we all just clicked instantly,” Eddings said. “We not only fit together on the court, but off the court as well. The newcomers really want to be here and they work hard to get better every day at practice.”
With both the men and women having successful seasons Haden hopes that will help build the fan base and continue to get fans excited about basketball in Statesboro.
“Is exciting to be a part of this wave and we are hoping to make Georgia Southern a basketball school also,” Haden said. “We have seen our support grow and we just want to do our part. We know winning is a big part of that as well as getting out into the community so people feel connected to us. I can’t be prouder of this group for what they do on the court as well as off. We had a team record from the past 10 years with a 3.57 GPA and we did over 180 hours of community service so I feel they are deserving of the support they are getting.”
Anderson named Player of the Week
Georgia Southern women's basketball senior forward Kishyah Anderson has been named the Sun Belt Conference Player of the Week, announced today by league officials.
Anderson averaged 24.0 points, 7.0 rebounds and 3.0 steals per game as Georgia Southern won a pair of Sun Belt contests last week to improve to 5-1 in the league, the best start to a conference season since the Eagles joined the SBC in 2014. The Phoenix, Ariz., native hit 12-of-14 shots from the floor en route to 26 points in Wednesday's 78-70 win over preseason league favorite James Madison, then followed that up with 22 points and nine rebounds in Saturday's 77-60 victory over Old Dominion.
For the week, Anderson shot 67.9 percent from the floor and also hit 75 percent from the free throw line. She has tallied 20+ point performances in four of the last five games for the Eagles as well.
Anderson is the second Eagle to earn weekly honors from the Sun Belt this season, joining Destiny Garrett.
