Friday, December 13
Philadelphia, PA
5:30 PM
Millersville University
at
Jefferson
Photo by: 2024 Sophia Stempinski
Final non-PSAC contests provide no respite for surging Marauders
12/12/2024 7:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Countdown to Gameday
Millersville Women's Basketball
Women's Basketball
at Charleston
Nov 13, 2026 at 4:00 PM
0
Days 0
Hours 0
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Secsat Jefferson:
vs. Georgian Court:
ABOUT THE GAMES
- The Millersville Marauders (6-2, 3-1) first travel to Philadelphia to take on the Jefferson Rams (7-2, 1-1) on Dec. 13 before returning home to play the Georgian Court Lions (1-8, 1-1) on Dec. 15. The two Central Atlantic Collegiate Conference (CACC) squads represent Millersville's final two games against teams outside of the Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference (PSAC) of the season and the contest against the Lions is the team's only Sunday game of the year.
- Millersville enters a stretch of three games in five days beginning with the Rams on Dec. 13 and finishing with a visit to Clarion on Tuesday, Dec. 17. While Clarion is in the PSAC West, it will not count towards Millersville's conference record. That is because the departure of Mercyhurst from the conference created an imbalance in the number of teams in each division and necessitated a random draw prior to the start of the season to determine which Marauder game against a PSAC West opponent would not count as a PSAC game. More information on the situation can be found in the schedule note at the bottom of this page.
WBB: AND ONE ?? pic.twitter.com/90N7u3H8N5
— Millersville Marauders (@VilleMarauders) December 7, 2024
SCOUTING THE MARAUDERS
- Millersville is coming off of an impressive weekend despite going just 1-1. The loss was a 63-62 defeat against Seton Hill, who moved from No. 11 to No. 7 in this week's D2CSC National Rankings. They followed that up with a 38-point demolition of Pitt-Johnstown on Dec. 7, which was the team's largest margin of victory since the beginning of the 2011-12 campaign.
- Despite holding the second-ranked offense in the country (Seton Hill) to 25 points below their season average and obliterating the Mountain Cats, the Marauders actually lost votes in the latest Atlantic Regional Rankings; they went from receiving votes to getting none at all. Millersville will have a chance to prove the voters wrong with a defeat of the Jefferson Rams, who are the third ranked team in the East region.
- The Marauders have come together as a team over recent games and are beginning to show where their true identity lies: on defense. They sport the eighth-best defense in terms of field goal percentage in Division II, keeping the opposition to just 31.6% from the field. They rank a less gaudy 55th in the nation in terms of scoring defense, but that is skewed a bit by three overtime periods. Over the last four games the Marauders have held the opposition to 28.1% from the field and just two players have scored more than 14 points against them; Cal U's Alicia Young had 22 points on 28 shots while Pitt-Johnstown's Belle Bosch had 18 on 17 shots.
- The defensive success has come through the commitment of all 13 Marauders on that end of the floor and it all came together against PItt-Johnstown. In the games first 10 minutes, UPJ shot just 2-of-16 from the floor and committed four turnovers while the hosts went on a 20-0 run in the middle of the period to finish with a 28-5 lead, effectively putting the game away in the process. Forward/center Morgan Mahoney anchored the defense and had an excellent weekend overall, leading the team with 17 points and two blocks against Seton Hill and tallying six points and a swat in limited action against UPJ.
- While early in the season it was Makiah Shaw that was leading the offensive charge, that honor has changed from game-to-game upon entering conference play. Four different players have led the Marauders in scoring this season: Shaw has done it twice, Kali March three times, Bryn Zentner twice, and Mahoney the one time against Seton Hill. March runs the offense as the team's point guard and when the Marauders need a bucket, look for her or Shaw to take the shot.
SCOUTING THE RAMS
- The Rams are coming off of their best season by record during the 35 seasons of head coach Tom Shirley's tenure. Jefferson went 32-2 last season and won the CACC while making the NCAA Region final. This year has not been as good thus far, as the team fell for the second time this year last time out against No. 20 Holy Family on Dec. 7. The Rams had been ranked No. 21 in the country last week but the loss moved them to the receiving votes section as the first team out of the top 25.
- The 64-74 loss to the Tigers could have been much worse, as Holy Family dominated points off of turnovers (21-3), second chance points (12-7), fast break points (13-1), and points in the paint (44-26). The Rams' only saving grace was their 41.7% mark from beyond the arc and an 83.3% mark from the free-throw line.
- Four of Shirley's five starters will likely see more than 30 minutes of action and senior guard Emma Kuczynski leads the team with an average of 36.3 minutes per game. In the team's last six games, she's spent just eight minutes on the bench and played all 45 minutes of their overtime loss to West Chester on Dec. 1. Kuczynski also leads the Rams' active players in points per game (15.5), steals per game (2.1) and three-pointers made (19). She's their only real outside threat, as those 19 threes account for over two-thirds of the team's total; despite that, she's has been deadly, cashing in on half of her attempts thus far in 2024-25.
- Someone that Jefferson has surely missed is senior forward Sam Yencha, who hasn't played since Nov. 13. She averaged a double-double in her three games played this season and was the CACC player of the year in 2023-24 after averaging 15.3 PPG and 11.6 RPG for Shirley's dominant squad. The task of replacing her in the paint has gone to freshman Gabby Recinto, and she's been up and down in that role; Recinto had four points total against East Stroudsburg and West Chester but almost tallied a 20-20 game against Goldey Beacom with 18 points and 19 rebounds.
- Senior center Cassie Murphy and sophomore guard Emma Spratt have helped fill the offensive hole left by Yencha's absence, averaging 14.6 and 12 points per contest, respectively. Rounding out the Ram's starting five is point guard Tori Nigro, who doesn't score much but has averaged nearly five assists per game this season.
SCOUTING THE LIONS
- Like last week's games, where the Marauders first faced a nationally ranked foe before taking on a one-win team, Millersville faces a lesser opponent in the 1-8 Georgian Court Lions. The Lions came within three points of their second win last Saturday but fell to the Chestnut Hill Griffins, 77-74. Those are the same Griffins that Millersville beat by 15 on Nov. 12 of this year, which bodes well for the hosts.
- That was by far the Lions' closest loss of the season. Outside of that game and their 78-49 win to open up conference play against Wilmington (Del.), they've lost every contest by 30 or more points, with the greatest margin coming in their season-opening 105-33 loss at Southern Connecticut St. on Nov. 9. That's all accumulated into an average point differential of -31.1, which ranks 289th out of 290 Division II teams; the only team below them is Wilmington with a margin of -32.4.
- There are a few reasons for the Lions' struggles. Chief among them is the 23.4 turnovers they average per game, which is 277th in the country. Georgian Court ranks in the bottom 50 in most statistical categories overall, including field goal percentage for and against as well as blocks per game.
- Despite those numbers, the Lions have been good at getting steals, averaging 7.9 per game. Karissa Smedley and Niyell McCargo lead the charge in that category, averaging 1.8 and 1.4 per contest, respectively. McCargo and Smedley are also second and third on the team in scoring with freshman Maria Stanescu pacing the team at 7.9 PPG. Stanescu is a guard in her first year from Bucuresti, Romania, and feasted in the team's two conference contests. She put up 20 points against Wilmington and one-upped herself against Chestnut Hill with 24. The opposite was true in the team's two matchups against PSAC teams, however, as Stanescu was held scoreless in both games.
SERIES HISTORY
Jefferson:
- The series history favors the Marauders with a record of 15-9, but these two teams have met just once since the 2012-13 season. That was last year, on Dec. 4, 2023 and the Rams, then ranked No. 8 in the nation, trounced the Marauders 65-40 to move to 9-0 on the season. Sam Yencha led the way for the Rams with 15 points and 12 rebounds and Millersville was held to just 31.8% from the field and 0-of-8 from three. Prior to that, the Marauders had downright owned the rivalry over the previous two decades; Millersville, then led by head coach Mary Fleig, won eight straight against the then-Philadelphia University Rams between Nov. 14, 1998 and Nov. 26, 2012.
Georgian Court:
- This will be the first ever meeting between these two programs.
PSAC Roundup & Standings
- In a very early look at the PSAC standings, Millersville moved to first in the East Division with a 3-1 conference record after last weekend as the only team with three wins in the East. Lock Haven is right behind them at 6-2 overall with a mark of 2-1 in conference; their only loss in PSAC play was to No. 16 Indiana (Pa.) on Nov. 23. Bloomsburg looks to have taken a step forward in 2024 despite a 1-2 record against the PSAC West, as their losses were by three points to powerhouse No. 11 Gannon and a five-point loss to resurgent Clarion in overtime.
- The Western Division has been a bloodbath thus far in 2024-25. Three ranked teams make their home in the West (No. 7 Seton Hill, No. 11 Gannon and No. 16 IUP) and Edinboro was essentially voted the 27th best team in the country in the latest D2CSC Poll. Those four squads are all 4-0 in conference play while Clarion sits fifth at 3-1 in a shocking turn of events; the Golden Eagles finished last year just 1-27 but the improvement of Autumn Taylor (20.1 PPG) and others has lifted them to new heights in 24-25.
Upcoming Schedule
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