HPU Women’s Hoops Opens League Play Against Longwood

HIGH POINT, N.C. – The High Point University women’s basketball team returns home from Cancun to kick off Big South action against Longwood on Tuesday at 7:00 p.m. in the Millis Center.

Live Stats | Live Video | Live Audio | Game Notes

LAST TIME OUT
The Panthers dropped their two contests to UAB (56-46) and Georiga Teach (81-61) in the 2015 Cancun Challenge at the Hard Rock Hotel Riviera Maya over Thanksgiving break. Junior Kaylah Keys earned all-tournament honors averaging 14.0 points in her two outings in Mexico.

KEYS’ CLIMB
• Junior Kaylah Keys is sixth on HPU’s Division I scoring list with 1,134 career points and is 66 away from tying Cheyenne Parker (2010-13) from fifth.
• Keys has drilled 149 3-pointers in 2-plus seasons in the Purple & White, which is good for second all-time in High Point history. Jurica Hargraves (2007-11) sits atop the list with 229 in her career.
• The Southaven, Miss. native is sixth in the Division I era with 229 made free throws.

PANTHER NOTES
• High Point went 9-1 in home conference games last season and is 23-6 in Big South contests in the Millis Center under DeUnna Hendrix.
• The team’s seven freshmen are logging 62 percent of the minutes and are scoring 51 percent of HPU’s points on the year.
• Freshman Haleigh Hatfield is coming off her best outing as a Panther with 17 points and seven rebounds against Georgia Tech.
• Freshman Emma Bockrath has scored in double figures in two straight games and three of the last four.

SCOUTING LONGWOOD
• The Lancers are 1-4 this season with losses to No. 9 Oregon State, James Madison, Virginia and UNCG. The squad’s lone win came against N.C. Central.
• In its last outing, Longwood fell 81-60 at UNCG despite 16 points from senior Kyndal Skersick.
• Skersick leads the team in scoring with 9.5 points per game while six players score over 4.0 points per outing.
• Senior Raven Williams was on the preseason All-Big South second team and is posting 4.2 points and 3.0 rebounds per game.
• Of the seven players that average at least 17 minutes per game, six are upperclassmen with sophomore Micaela Ellis being the outlier.

ALL-TIME SERIES WITH THE LANCERS
• The Panthers lead the all-time series 20-11 including wins in the last eight meetings with the Lancers.
• Head coach DeUnna Hendrix is 6-0 against the Lancers and with all but one of the matchups being decided by double figures.
• The Purple & White are 12-3 in the Millis Center against Longwood with the last home loss coming on Jan. 18, 1997.

LAST TIME THEY MET
HPU took both of the matchups between the two programs last season with an 81-60 win at home and a 77-63 win in Farmville, Va. Keys averaged 13.5 points in the two victories while then-freshman Kat Harris tallied a season-high 12 points in the team’s home game on Dec. 2, 2014.

NEXT UP
The Purple & White stay at home on Saturday when they welcome Radford to the Millis Center at 2:00 p.m.