Adam MacDonald
The Valdosta Daily Times
VALDOSTA —
The Valdosta State Lady Blazers will play in their ninth national tournament today when they tip off with the Fort Valley State Lady Wildcats at 5 p.m.
The Lady Blazers and Lady Wildcats, separated by a two-hour stretch of I-75, will meet for the first time since 2002 and they will do it hundreds of miles from Georgia in the Tucker Coliseum in Russellville, Ark.
The winner advances to the Round of 32 and a likely date on Sunday with Delta State.
The game will be broadcast on 92.1 FM.
Fort Valley State (26-2) enters the game as the regular season Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Conference champion. The Lady Wildcats are ranked No. 10 in the country, but after losing to lowly Stillman in the quarterfinals of the SIAC tournament, they fell to No. 3 in the South Region.
The Lady Wildcats are led by SIAC player of the year Takesha Riggs, a senior guard who averages 15.4 points and 4.9 rebounds per game. She has also dished out 111 assists and stolen the ball 89 times.
Sophomore Kendra Evans is averaging 12.2 points and 6.2 rebounds per game. She shoots 50.5 percent from the field and was named second team All-SIAC.
Fort Valley is coached by Lonnie Bartley, who is in his 26th season as head coach. Bartley has a 572-192 record at Fort Valley and is the SIAC coach of the year.
Thanks to a 14-game winning streak to close the season and a win in the Gulf South Conference tournament quarterfinals, the Lady Blazers (19-8) captured the No. 6 seed in the South Region.
The Lady Blazers started the season poorly with a 4-7 record and had an extremely weak strength of schedule down the stretch, but their 14-game winning streak was plenty to get an at-large bid.
Four Lady Blazers (Michelle Thompson, Brittany Daniels, Tamika Booker and Leschelle Matthews) average at least eight points per game.
Despite being just hours apart, the Lady Blazers and Lady Wildcats do not play each other that often. VSU holds a 24-12 advantage in the series, but Fort Valley won the last game 58-32 in December 2002. VSU coach Kiley Hill is 1-1 against the Lady Wildcats.
The two teams have played four common opponents this season — Columbus State, West Georgia, Albany State and Clark Atlanta. Fort Valley is 6-0 against those teams and VSU is 6-1, with the only loss coming in overtime to Columbus State.
The winner of today’s game moves on to play the winner of Delta State/Lynn on Sunday.
