May 25, 2013
Women's Basketball preview: at No. 8/8 Tennessee
Dec. 1, 2011
No. 21/22 TEXAS (5-1) at No. 8/8 Tennessee (3-2) Sunday, Dec. 4, 2011 • 1 p.m. Cenral • FS South Thompson-Boling Arena (21,678) • Knoxville, Tenn. GAME DAY QUICK FACTS TELEVISION: The game will be televised by FS South (Time Warner Cable Ch. 432 in Austin). Bob Kesling (pxp) and Debbie Antonelli (analyst) will call the action. INTERNET: The game will be streamed live by ESPN3.com - http://es.pn/wcbb-ut-utk RADIO: KVET-AM 1300 "The Zone" will broadcast Sunday's game at Tennessee. Craig Way (pxp) and Carol Ross (analyst) will handle the calls. SERIES: Tennessee, 20-12. Last meeting: Tennessee 92-77 (Dec. 12, 2010; Austin) NOTABLES • FIVE IN A ROW ... With a three-game sweep at the Waikiki Beach Marriott Rainbow Wahine Showdown, the Longhorns are on a five-game win streak entering Sunday's contest at Tennessee. Texas is averaging a +17.6 scoring margin in its victories. • SPOTLIGHT ON FUSSELL ... Sophomore guard Chassidy Fussell returns home to the Volunteer State as the reigning College Sports Madness National Women's Basketball Player of the Week and Big 12 Player of the Week after earning unanimous MVP honors at the Waikiki Beach Marriott Rainbow Wahine Showdown (Nov. 25-27). • SENIORS ON POINT ... Senior guards Ashleigh Fontenette and Yvonne Anderson own 2.7 and 1.9 assist-to-turnover ratios, respectively. Anderson has dished out a team-high 29 assists while Fontenette has added 19. • FONTENETTE CLOSING IN ON 1K MARK ... Senior guard Ashleigh Fontenette has 998 career points entering Sunday's game and is on pace to become the 36th player in Texas history to reach the 1,000 career-point milestone. Series vs. Tennessee Sunday's contest marks the 33rd meeting between Texas and Tennessee. Tennessee leads the all-time series 20-12. The series first began with an 84-60 Texas loss on Dec. 8, 1978, at a neutral site in the Mid-America Invitational. After that, the Longhorns went on to win seven of the next eight contests before the Lady Vols won the next 13 games. Over the last 10 match ups, the series is tied at 5-5 with the Lady Vols winning the last two meetings. Texas' most recent victory in the series was a 73-59 decision on Dec. 14, 2008, in Austin. Goestenkors vs. Tennessee Sunday's contest marks the 14th meeting between Texas head coach Gail Goestenkors and Tennessee. Tennessee holds a 7-6 edge in the all-time series, but Goestenkors has led her teams to five victories in the last eight contests. Texas and Tennessee Ties Texas assistant coach LaKale Malone is a native of Murfreesboro, Tenn., while sophomore guard Chassidy Fussell was born and raised in Troy. Tennessee assistant coach Mickie DeMoss served on the Texas sidelines from 2007-10. Tennessee Basketball Operations Director Kathy Harston was an assistant coach at Texas from 1989-2007 under Jody Conradt while the Longhorns made 14 NCAA Tournament appearances (including Sweet 16 showings in 2002 and 2004, as well as a Final Four berth in 2003) and eight conference championships (five regular season titles, three tournament championships). Most notably, Conradt and Tennessee head coach Pat Summitt are both Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame inductees and the only two coaches to each record 900 or more victories in Women's College Basketball. Check of the Polls UT climbed three places to No. 21 in the most recent Associated Press poll (Nov. 28) and remained at No. 22 in the ESPN/USA Today poll (Nov. 29). Last Time Out: at Hawai'i (Nov. 27, 2011) Chassidy Fussell scored 15 points to lead No. 24 Texas over Hawaii 71-50 on Sunday night in the final round of the Rainbow Wahine Showdown. The Longhorns (5-1) took the lead midway through the first half and never gave it back, leading by as many as 26 points after the break. They shot 48 percent from the field (30 of 62) in the game. Yvonne Anderson added 13 points and Ashley Gayle pulled down nine rebounds for Texas, who beat the Warriors (1-6) on the boards 37-31. Breanna Arbuckle scored 22 points for the Warriors, who went 17 for 51 from the field. Flashback: vs. #8/7 Tennessee (Dec. 12, 2010) Angie Bjorklund scored 20 points in the first half and Meighan Simmons added 18 to lead Tennessee to a 92-77 victory over Texas. Bjorklund provided the early punch with four 3-pointers in the first half, then Simmons took over in the second as the Lady Vols (9-1) steadily pulled away and sent Texas (5-3) to its third loss against a ranked team. Kathleen Nash scored 21 points to lead Texas. Texas Against Ranked Opponents Texas sports a 1-1 record against ranked opponents entering Sunday's game at No. 8 Tennessee. The Longhorns fell 72-59 to No. 5 Stanford (Nov. 11) in the season opener before topping No. 22 Virginia (Nov. 25) 79-53. UT last beat a Top 10 opponent on Feb. 1, 2009, when it handed then-No. 4 Baylor a 58-55 loss in Waco. "Together, or Not at All" Texas lived up to its team motto while in the Aloha State. Over the three-game span, the Longhorns accumulated 45 assists on 77 field goals. On the season, Texas has been credited with 92 assists on 152 shots (60.5 percent). Senior Yvonne Anderson leads the squad with 29 assists while senior Ashleigh Fontenette and sophomore Chassidy Fussell have passed out 19 and 14, respectively. She Walks the Line Sophomore guard Chassidy Fussell leads UT from the free throw line with a 23-of-25 mark (.920). Her only two misses came against Virginia where she was 8-of-10 from the line. Threes are Falling Again After connecting on just 11 3-point field goals in the first three games, Texas hit seven treys in its 79-53 win against Virginia. Sophomore guard Chassidy Fussell tied her career-high with four made from beyond the arc. Senior guard Yvonne Anderson's 42.1 percent mark (8-of-19) from long distance leads the Longhorns. Block Buster Senior post Ashley Gayle became the Texas career blocks leader with her 290th swat against Alcorn State (Nov. 21). Gayle broke Ellen Bayer's 21-year-old record of 289 career blocks set in 1990. Through 104 games, Gayle has totaled 303 career blocks. She also holds the single-season record of 117 set in 2010-11. Comeback Attack Chassidy Fussell gave Texas its only lead of the game when she scored with 1:11 left to lift the Longhorns over California 61-60 in the Rainbow Wahine Showdown (Nov. 26). Trailing by as many as 14 points, Texas rallied within eight points eight times before taking its only lead of the game on Fussell's layup with just over one minute remaining.
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