GREENEVILLE, Tenn. --- Catherine Hintz scored the go-ahead basket with 51 seconds left in regulation to break a 73-73 tie and Tusculum College survived a pair of game-tying shot attempts to come away with a 77-73 victory over Carson-Newman College in South Atlantic Conference Women's basketball action Wednesday night at Pioneer Arena.
Hintz finished with 16 points and 12 rebounds and Jasmine Gunn just missed a triple double as she tallied 21 points, eight rebounds and a season-high 10 assists as the Pioneers (15-6, 11-2 SAC) won their ninth straight game and snapped the four-game winning streak of the Eagles (10-13, 6-7 SAC).
Zoriah Williams led the Eagles with 21 points and a game-high 16 rebounds while Mandy Mendenhall scored all 18 of her points in the final 13:10 to spark a Carson-Newman comeback from a 15-point deficit. Also scoring in double figures for the Eagles were Shannon Depew (12 points) and Whitney Moody (11 points).
Kendal Baxter matched Hintz with 16 points off the bench for the Pioneers, sinking four three-pointers in eight attempts. Staci Hicks added nine points and six rebounds and Jasmine Parker chipped in with six points, four rebounds and four steals.
Tusculum held a comfortable 59-44 lead with 12:27 left, but the Eagles halved the deficit to eight over the next 2 1/2 minutes to pull within 59-51 with 10:25 to go. The Pioneers still led 71-65 with 4:31 to go, but Mendenhall converted a three-point play to cut the deficit to one and hit a baseline jumper with 3:11 to go to give the Eagles their first and only lead of the night at 72-71.
Gunn answered with two free throws with 2:12 to go to push the Pioneers back on top 73-72, and Williams responded with a free throw to even the score at 73 with 1:54 left. After an exchange of missed shots, Hintz converted inside to give the Pioneers a 75-73 advantage.
Carson-Newman turned the ball back over on an offensive foul with 40 seconds to go, but a missed shot by the Pioneers with 19 seconds left gave the Eagles possession with a chance to tie. Williams missed a pair of short jumpers, with the second miss going to Gunn with under four seconds to play. She was fouled and sank both free throws with two seconds remaining to clinch the victory.
After the teams went 2 1/2 minutes without a point to start the game, the Pioneers finally broke through as Linda Aughburns scored on a layup with 17:31 left in the first half. The bucket sparked a 9-2 run which Aughburns capped with a fast-break layup with five minutes gone in the contest.
The Eagles came back to knot the game at 14-14 on a layup by Amber Blackwell with 11:02 left in the first half, but the Pioneers came back with six straight points to go on top 20-14 on a Parker jumper with 9:36 to go in the half.
Carson-Newman tied the game at 27-27 on a jumper by Moody with 3:02 left in the first half, but Tusculum scored 14 of the next 16 points to go into halftime with a 41-29 lead. Gunn spearheaded the Pioneer surge, dishing out three assists during the run including a behind-the-back feed to Hicks for a fast-break layup with 1:12 to go.
Tusculum shot an even 50 percent from the field (18-for-36) in the first half, as Hintz led the way by shooting 4-for-6 and tallying a team-high nine points. Gunn added eight points, five rebounds and seven assists while Hicks tallied seven points and four boards. Williams paced the Eagles with game highs of 10 points and eight rebounds, but her teammates combined to shoot 35.3 percent (12-for-34) in the opening half.
Overall, the Pioneers shot 46.3 percent (31-for-67), including 5-for-12 from three-point range, but connected on just 10-for-17 from the free throw line. Carson-Newman shot 50 percent (15-for-30) in the second half to lift their final percentage to 42.2 percent (27-for-64). Each team committed 18 turnovers, with the Pioneers converting the Eagle miscues into 28 points, and Tusculum finished with a slim 40-39 edge on the boards over Carson-Newman.
The Pioneers will square off with Wingate on Saturday at 2 p.m. in a showdown of the top two teams in the SAC. Tusculum (11-2) currently holds a two-game lead over the Bulldogs (9-4) in the league standings with five games remaining.
- TC -
