ARN follow up on record-setting women's hoops game

• Read Joey Richards' Abilene Reporter News Article feature on the follow up of the women's basketball game that set several NCAA, LSC, and school records in a 147-143 4 OT victory over Texas Woman's.

ACU making SportsCenter appearances a regular thing

It started in May when ACU's centerfielder Thomas Bumpass made ESPN's SportsCenter Top 10 Plays with an amazing catch in the NCAA Division II Regional Tournament. Then, ACU's football team defeated West Texas A&M 93-68 in the second round of the NCAA Division II Football Playoffs in November; that earned the school multiple spots on the world's most popular sports news show. Then both last night and this afternoon, the ACU Women's Basketball team earned national recognition on SportsCenter for their 147-143 4 OT win over Texas Woman's at Moody Coliseum.

We hope to get video posted soon of today's clip which featured shots of ACU's coaches Shawna Lavender and Terri Pertuit. The video, courtesy of Abilene's NBC affiliate KRBC, also showed a highlight of junior forward Jamie Meyer scoring two of her 49 points (school record) and gave face-time to senior forward Kristee Davidson scoring a basket.

However, we do have video (click here) (you'll need quicktime) of the initial report from ESPN on the game that ran late last night. It talked about the game and TWU's Renee Renz who scored 63 points in the loss for the Pioneers.

On Monday's show, Lavender, Meyer and Davidson were shown in highlights on the bump before heading to commercial with 15 minutes left in the show. Then in the final segment, the highlights show a layup from Davidson, a bucket from Meyer, and a clip of Lavender and Pertuit talking to Davidson in a huddle. Then the anchors (Jay Harris, Brian Kenny) mentioned some of the NCAA records set in the game including the most combined points. It then showed a screen with "Notable High-Scoring Games" including Navy's 74-62 football victory in 2007, and Loyola Marymount's men's hoops team defeating U.S. International 181-150 in 1989. They could have easily mentioned ACU's 93-68 football win over WTAMU, but hey, we'll let it slide.

At the end of the show Brian Kenny joked that "Hopefully they get a good crowd next time at Texas Abilene, now they deserve it, what more do you want?" And yes, he did say "Texas Abilene."

The Wildcats accomplished this feat in front of roughly 200 fans Monday night.

So now that ACU has scored 93 points in a football game, and 147 points in a women's basketball game; it is now up to softball coach Chantiel Wilson and baseball coach Britt Bonneau to coach their teams to 50-run games this year.

ACU likes to score points

What is it with the Wildcats and super-high scoring games this year? Just a few weeks after ACU's football team posted an NCAA Playoff record 93 points in a win over West Texas A&M, the women's basketball team topped Texas Woman's University 147-143 in four overtimes. The 290 combined points between the two teams was an NCAA record and just one of many national, Lone Star Conference, and school records set Monday night. Jamie Meyer (pictured) scored a school-record 49 points in the victory and the Wildcats moved to 8-4 on the season.

Read the game story here.

Two galleries

As usual, thanks to Gerald Ewing for all his work for ACU and its athletics department with photos for us to use on the web, in media guides, and recently on the galleries I've been posting.

Here are two basketball galleries from recent games:

MBB: vs. Howard Payne 01/01/09
WBB: vs. Texas A&M-Commerce 01/03/09

Come out to Moody Coliseum tonight for your pre-Fiesta Bowl activities and see the women take on Texas Woman's at 6 p.m.

After solid starts, both hoops teams looking for even more consistency

ACU’s basketball teams are sharing similar experiences now that each is a little over one-third of the way done with this season. Jason Copeland’s men are 6-4 and Shawna Lavender’s women reciprocate at 6-4. While many of the teams around the nation would appreciate a 6-4 record to start the season, it’s safe to say that more consistent play for both Wildcat teams could result in better records.

Luckily for ACU, the teams have a chance to continue ironing out the wrinkles as they prepare to head into Lone Star Conference South Division play. The Wildcats don’t begin South Division play until Jan. 13 in a home doubleheader against Eastern New Mexico.

Today, both teams play Texas A&M-Commerce, then the women have three crossover games and the men have two before the meeting with ENMU.

Another commonality for both teams is that when the Wildcat point guards are playing well, it seems that the rest of the players follow suit.

Riley Lambert, the men’s point guard, has 36 (six per game) assists and only 11 turnovers (1.8 per game) in ACU’s six wins. However, in the Wildcats’ four losses he has just 11 assists (2.75 per game) and has recorded 17 turnovers (4.25 per game).

On the women’s side, Kat Kundmueller averages 7.8 points, 6.8 assists, and 3.2 turnovers in Wildcat wins. When ACU loses the assists go down and the turnovers rise. She averages seven points, 3.5 assists and 3.3 turnovers in four ACU losses this season.

As I’m typing this post, it appears that the ACU women will move to 7-4 with a convincing win over Commerce where Kundmueller has seven points, nine assists and just one turnover; just further proof that ACU is feeding off her solid play this season.

Dante Adams and Jamie Meyer are each having much-improved seasons for ACU to help leading scorers Dejan Sencanski and Audrey Maxwell-Lively for the men and women respectively. While Sencanski and Maxwell-Lively are each in familiar spots among the top of ACU’s scoring charts, Adams and Meyer are bolstering their teams thus far in the season.

Through Dec. 31, Meyer is averaging 11.6 points per game after an 8.7 average last season. Adams, who nearly sat out this season with a medical redshirt is averaging 12.6 points (6.0 last season), his rebounding average is up a point and a half, and his 15 steals this season nearly equals the 18 he tallied in 29 games last season.

Check back for more updates, photo galleries, and be sure and come to Moody Coliseum Jan. 13 as the Wildcats open up conference play.