by Danny Kotula | Feb 13, 2022 | News Slider, Sports
NASHVILLE – The Lipscomb men’s basketball team held onto a second-half lead to beat the Eastern Kentucky Colonels 83-73 Saturday evening at Allen Arena. Behind three double-digit scorers and seven players scoring five or more points, a balanced Bisons offense was too much for the visiting Colonels to overcome. Second-year freshman guard Tommy Murr led Lipscomb with 16 points on 5-7 shooting, including a 4-6 mark from beyond the three-point line. Hailing from Athens, Alabama, Murr added eight rebounds, three assists, and a block off the bench. Bench scoring was a key for the Bisons, as they outscored EKU 38-28 across their substitutes. Sophomore guard KJ Johnson found a major role as a bench player in his fifth straight game being replaced in the starting five by freshman Trae Benham. Johnson scored 8 points, including two momentum-building threes, while adding three assists and a defensive rebound. “I’ve been struggling a little bit from the three this season, so it was definitely good to just get some of them to fall tonight,” the third-year guard from Lewisburg said. “My teammates made the right looks to get me open.” Coming into the game averaging over 15 points per contest, leading scorer Ahsan Asadullah earned his first career double-double without points being one of the categories. The senior center from Atlanta only managed five points, all of which came at the free throw line, but he dished out 10 assists and picked up 10 rebounds on the night, running the offense for a majority of his 30 minutes on the court. “That’s just the type of player Ahsan is,” Johnson said. “He’s...
by Danny Kotula | Feb 11, 2022 | News Slider, Sports
Lipscomb women’s tennis head coach Jamie Aid will be the first to mention the fact that Lipscomb has unfinished business to deal with this season. “Two years ago, we should have won [the ASUN Conference championship,” Aid said, “and we’re always building towards that. We’ve been in that position for the last eight years.” After three straight ASUN Tournament appearances but no conference titles to show for them, Aid is ready to change that narrative with a lineup made up of exuberance and experience alike. Two years removed from one of the more senior lineups Lipscomb has seen under Aid, including a top-30 ranked player in the nation in Vika Dzyuba, the squad has three underclassmen in the rotation this year. After eight years of watching young women come through her program, though, Aid isn’t concerned about their maturity. “We don’t really deal with some of the immature things that [other sports’] freshman do; they’re often more worldly than even I am.” Tennis is frequently one of the more international sports on campus, and this season, the Bisons boast seven internationally-born players on a roster of nine. “It’s neat to hear their stories, and they’re more similar than you’d think. The tennis world is pretty small; everybody seems to know everybody else.” For the Lipscomb tennis program, much of the success they find on the court is a secondary byproduct of a larger mentality of long-term development. “Finding players isn’t necessarily the problem,” Aid said. “Finding players that want to invest in Lipscomb that are going to take the most from the scholarship academically and put it into practice,...
by Danny Kotula | Feb 6, 2022 | News Slider, Sports
NASHVILLE – The Lipscomb women’s basketball team lost to #20 Florida Gulf Coast 73-55 Saturday afternoon at Allen Arena. Behind five players contributing nine or more points, the visiting Eagles won their 21st game of the season and improved the sixth-best away winning streak in NCAA women’s basketball history to 28 games. Despite Florida Gulf Coast’s undefeated 9-0 ASUN record coming into the game, Bisons assistant coach Chris Sumski said his expectations for the team were high. “I’ll be honest, we do expect to win,” Sumski said in a continuation of a team-positive narrative all season long. “We are crazy enough to always believe that [we can win], even though we will admit FGCU is a really good talented basketball team.” Lipscomb was bolstered heavily on offense by its bench, as junior wing Maddie Cook and graduate shooting guard Sydney Shelton scored 10 points each to lead the team. Shelton went 2-3 from behind the arc, while Cook took 13 shots on the afternoon and converted on five. “The last couple of games, I think we’ve taken some big steps in that direction,” Sumski said. “We don’t want to rely on one or two people carrying the scoring. We want to score everywhere, and I think we’re starting to understand how we can do that within our offense.” The game may not have gone down to the wire, but the matchup was competitive throughout. Hot shooting early led Lipscomb to trail FGCU 13-12 at the media break, but the Eagles went on a 5-0 run to end the quarter at 23-17. In the second quarter, a strong defensive showing...
by Danny Kotula | Feb 2, 2022 | News Slider, Sports
The athletics rivalry between Lipscomb and Belmont has stood the test of time, dating back to 1953 in men’s basketball, where the rivalry is most heated. One hundred and forty-nine games later, the Battle of the Boulevard continues to be an event of importance on campus across all sports. While NCAA Division I basketball’s closest geographical rivalry is the jewel in the Battle of the Boulevard’s crown, sports across campus feel the effects of the rivalry between the two sides in south Nashville. Since nearly every sport hosted by both schools pits the two together, a common benchmark for who is winning the Battle is the overall number of wins across all sports during a season. Midway through the 2021-22 school year, it’s time to have a look at how Lipscomb is doing against its rival up the road in each sport. Baseball: TBD Basketball: 0-2 Women: L 62-67 @ Belmont. The women’s team put up a valiant effort against a Bruins team that received preseason top-25 votes, but their performance came up 5 points short despite a 4th-quarter lead.Men: L 65-94 @ Belmont. The men’s team struggled in perhaps the worst Battle of the Boulevard performance in Lipscomb men’s basketball history. Belmont dominated from start to finish and played a large portion of the second half with their reserves in the game. Soccer: 0-1-1 Women: L 0-1 v Belmont. While technically a preseason contest, the women’s soccer team suffered a rare loss in a highly successful fall 2021 season against their rivals to the north. They went on to achieve an ASUN championship and a NCAA National Tournament...
by Danny Kotula | Jan 24, 2022 | News Slider, Sports, Student Spotlight
Diana Saleh doesn’t pay much mind to those who tell her something isn’t possible for her. “I hate when people try to talk fear.” The story of the 6’3″ center’s path to Division I basketball at Lipscomb has always been unorthodox. From her unbridled desire to accomplish what seems impossible off the court to her work ethic and dedication on it, Saleh knows no boundaries. With the recent loss of Lipscomb’s starting center to injury, Saleh’s story seems to look more like a movie script with each passing day. This particular movie, though, boasts a script that would be the envy of any screenwriter in Hollywood. There is indeed a fearlessness inside the Michigan-raised sophomore, whether or not people talk fear around her. The fearlessness Saleh displays is, much like her, unique. It’s characterized by quiet, calculated confidence, the same confidence that exudes from her presence on and off the court. Whether the task at hand is a first-ever interview, blazing a trail for the next generation of female athletes, or juggling one of the hardest degree programs on campus with her basketball schedule, Saleh approaches it all with an assurance that can only come from past experience. And when it comes to know-how in stripping down stereotypes, Saleh has a world-class resume. Her very arrival at Lipscomb circumvented the status quo. Saleh’s hometown of Dearborn, Michigan, a suburb of nearby Detroit, could hardly be more different from Nashville. “I’ve been in Dearborn my entire life,” Saleh said. “It’s a high population of Arabs, and I would say it was kind of like a bubble. So coming here was...
