March is a month of madness, and the Southern University women’s basketball team is back in the middle of it.
For the second time in three years, the Jaguars will play an NCAA Tournament game in California—this time, they will face UC San Diego in a First Four matchup.
The game is slated for 8 pm CST on ESPNU at Pauley Pavilion at UCLA.
Southern (20-14, 15-3) has won 10 of their last eleven games beating opponents by an average of 15 points.
UC San Diego (20-15, 13-7), winners of the Big West Conference Tournament, the Tritons have won nine of their last eleven games played.
The Jaguars entered the SWAC Tournament as the number one seed and had a first-round bye. They dominated their opponents by an 18.3 ppg margin of victory to win their second tournament title in three years.
“The team returned to campus on June 3 with two goals: to win a regular-season championship and make it to the NCAA tournament,” said head coach Carlos Funchess. “They sacrificed their entire summer to start working out and conditioning in preparation for the upcoming season. They knew with the addition of nine new players this would be critical to our success, so they were all in.”
Southern comes into the game averaging 59.8 points, 33.6 rebounds, 11 steals per game and forcing 18.9 turnovers a game.
Aniya Gourdine has led the Jaguars the majority of the season averaging 12.8 points a game. Soniyah Reed is the only other Jaguar that averages double-digits with 10.7 points. Three other Southern players average over five points per game. Aleighyah Fontenot is third on the team at 7.9, followed by Tionna Lidge at 7.1 and Jocelyn Tate at 6.5.
The Tritons come into the game averaging 64.1 points and give up 58 per game on defense.
UC San Diego is led by Sumayah Sugapong at 14.7 and Sabrina Ma at 10.1 points. Rounding out the top five for the Tritons are Gracie Gallegos at 9.5, Erin Condron with 8.3, and Kayanna Spriggs at 7.9.
The winner of the First Four will take on No. 1 UCLA on Friday at 9 p.m. on ESPN.
“This moment means everything. Just being able to win the championship and make it this far is such a blessing,” said Southern guard Dakiyah Sanders. “I’m just really grateful to my team and just having great teammates alongside me to make it here.”
Courtesy: Southern Athletics
