Women's Basketball | 12/13/2014 8:00:00 AM
The NJIT women's basketball will visit St. John's on Sunday at 2pm in Carnesecca Arena on the St. John's campus.
The game will be broadcastvon ESPN3 with Ralph Bednarczyk and Scott Greene on the call, starting at 2pm. Fans unable to make the game can follow all the action live on www.njithighlanders.com, which will carry a webcast play-by-play and commentary from
Michael Ventola. Audio coverage begins a 15 minutes before the game.
St. John's, 23-11 a season ago, went all the way the BIG EAST championship game and later advanced to the second round of the NCAA Tournament. It was the Red Storm's fifth-straight NCAA appearance and ninth time in program history.
Coach
Joe Tartamella, entering his third season, guided the 2013-14 Red Storm to its first appearance in the BIG EAST championship game since 1988.
This season, St. John's (8-0) is one of 14 teams in the country remaining with a perfect record. The Red Storm was predicted to finish second in the BIG EAST preseason coaches' poll. Junior guard
Aliyyah Handford was a unanimous selection to the preseason all-Big East squad, where she was joined by junior guard
Danaejah Grant.
Handford, a big player to watch for the Red Storm, was a Women's Basketball Coaches Association (WBCA) honorable mention all-American last season. This year, she was selected to the 2014 Naismith Trophy Women's Top 50, the nation's most prestigious individual award, announced on December 10.
The Newark, NJ native, ranks second on the team in scoring (18.3ppg), rebounds (5.9rpg) and assists (20) while leading the Red Storm in the steals category (22). Handford has earned three consecutive Big East Weekly honors and is 10 points shy of becoming the 21st player in school history to record 1,000 points.
Grant, the Red Storm's guard from Piscataway, NJ, tops the team and Big East in scoring at 20.1ppg while shooting 46 percent from the field (65-for-140).
Senior forward
Amber Thompson, a native of Newark, NJ, named to the 2013-14 Big East honorable mention team, set St. John's single-season record for rebounds with 313. This season, Thompson, standing at 6-foot-2, has combined for 106 rebounds (13.3rpg) through the first eight contests, good for fifth in the nation (as of December 11).
St. John's and the Highlanders have only met once before, with a 55-37 victory for the Red Storm on November 28, 2012 at Carnesecca Arena.
The Highlanders (5-6), will play their next five games on the road, with two opponents from the Big East (St. John's and Seton Hall) and they play at Lafayette on December 21 before Christmas Break. NJIT will travel to South Carolina and visit Clemson on December 29 (new time scheduled for 1pm) and then begin the New Year at Wofford, also in South Carolina on January 2.
NJIT is led by senior point guard
Alyssa Albanese, who tops the team in three categories— scoring (10.9ppg), assists (43) and steals (14). In the teams' last game against LIU Brooklyn, Albanese dished out a game-high five assists becoming NJIT's Division I career assist leader with a total of 277.
Sophomore forward
Leah Horton is the Highlanders second leading scorer at 10.5ppg followed by classmate
Alana Dudley with 10.3ppg. In 11 games, Horton has combined for 90 rebounds, ranking first on the team at 8.2rpg.
Alana Dudley, who has played in 11 games, including 3 starts, has scored in double-figures in the last five contests with a career-high 16 points vs. North Dakota State at the FAU Thanksgiving Classic. In the three starts for the guard from Whippany, NJ, she is averaging 12.7ppg.
Senior center
Nicole Maticka, NJIT's career shot blocker, is coming off a 12 point, 6 rebounds and 6 blocked shot performance against LIU Brooklyn, raising her career total mark to 187 career blocks. Maticka is averaing 6.7ppg and 5.0rpg in 22.5 minutes of action.
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