by Danny Kotula | Feb 17, 2022 | News Slider, Sports
NASHVILLE – The Lipscomb men’s basketball team lost a tight contest against the Jacksonville State Gamecocks Wednesday night at Allen Arena 78-67. After losing by five points at Jacksonville State in January, it was another close contest in the second game of the season series with the same result. Second-year freshman Will Pruitt and graduate transfer Parker Hazen led the Bisons with 17 points and 5 rebounds apiece. Pruitt, a guard from Mt. Juliet, Tennessee, shot 4-10 from the field and made 6-7 free throws. Hailing from Columbia City, Indiana, Hazen went 6-12 from the floor and made 3-6 from behind the arc. Freshman shooting guard Tommy Murr scored 14 points for Lipscomb, his second straight game with double digits in scoring. “It’s a lot of fun because we play the game the right way,” the Athens, Alabama-born guard said. “We have a lot of really good players, and sometimes that shows, sometimes it doesn’t.” The scoreboard may not have shown Lipscomb’s quality, but the Bisons battled for 40 well-fought minutes against a highly talented JSU team. Despite 64% 3-point shooting in the first half, Lipscomb used key runs down the stretch of the first half to keep things level at 41-41 at the midway point. Led by junior guard Jalen Finch’s 14 points on perfect 4-4 three-point shooting, JSU jumped out to leads of eight points at the 15:15 mark and seven with under eight minutes to go in the half. Lipscomb responded in kind to both runs, eventually earning their first lead of the game with 3:27 on the clock. Pruitt knocked down a left-wing three as...
by Danny Kotula | Feb 16, 2022 | News Slider, Sports
The Lipscomb men’s tennis team has taken great strides in the past two years, but they aren’t looking to stay stagnant in the 2022 season. After posting a 7-14 record in 2019, the Bisons went 18-8 in their past two seasons combined and reached the semifinal of the ASUN tournament last year. In head coach Geoff Hernandez’ fifth season at the helm, Lipscomb will look to continue growing and perhaps even find their way to an ASUN Championship. In 2019, the Bisons went 9-1 in an abbreviated season that saw wins over 31st-ranked Vanderbilt, Tennessee, Louisville, and Belmont before COVID-19 ended the Bisons’ chances at a conference title. “When my brother [Mario] and I took over, it was kind of a growth period of just finding us, our style as coaches,” Hernandez said. “Then we had a breakthrough, getting to the finals [in 2017] as the 6-seed, which gave us a little bit of hope. As I’ve taken over, getting some of our recruits and some transfers, you know, the depth of the team has just gone up.” Last season, Lipscomb finished with a 9-7 record and a 4-2 ASUN mark while reaching the conference semifinals. The lineup Lipscomb brings to the table this season is a worldwide one, with five countries and three states represented. “You have to cast a wide net in tennis,” Hernandez said, “and there are certain elements of the players from Spain and South America that there was a real toughness and fight in them that I felt helped our breakthrough. Now, we’ve tried to pull from different places as well.” “The maturity of...
by Danny Kotula | Feb 15, 2022 | News Slider, Sports
NASHVILLE – The Lipscomb women’s basketball team lost to the North Alabama Lions 76-68 Monday afternoon at Allen Arena. Trailing for the majority of the game and down 17 early in the 4th quarter, the Bisons could only cut the lead to four points before the Lions finished the game off. Three players scored 14 or more points for the home team, with sophomore guard Jalyn Holcomb’s 15-point outing leading the way. The 2020 ASUN Freshman of the Year from Murfreesboro went 6-11 from the field and shot 3-5 at the three-point line. “I think [Holcomb] did a good job of trying to make the simple plays,” assistant coach Chris Sumski said, “not getting too far outside of herself. She did her job and she was unselfish, and that’s what we expect from Jalyn.” Junior Blythe Pearson earned her first career double-double, making 4-11 field goals and pulling down a game-leading 11 rebounds. Senior point guard Casey Collier had an efficient afternoon, shooting 6-8 from the floor and collecting 14 more points for Lipscomb. “[Collier] is a warrior,” Sumski said. “She competes on both ends of the floor, and our team wouldn’t be the same without her. A back-and-forth battle in the first quarter gave way to dominance offensively from North Alabama, who turned a three point lead at halftime into a 40-26 advantage at the halftime break. Shooting was the name of the game for the Lions, who shot 25-49 from the field and made 11 threes. Skyler Gill totaled 21 points on 9-15 shooting for the visitors from Florence. “Credit to them; they’re a good offensive team,”...
by Parker O'Neal | Feb 13, 2022 | News Slider, Sports
The stage is set for the 2022 Super Bowl between the Los Angeles Rams and the Cincinnati Bengals at Sofi Stadium in Inglewood, California Sunday afternoon. This will be only the second time in history that an N.F.L. team will host their own Super Bowl as the Bengals visit the Rams’ $5.5 billion stadium in Southern California. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers were the first team to host a Super Bowl just last season. After a wild month of playoffs, two 4-seeds will play in the Super Bowl which is the first time since the NFL merger that a 1-seed, 2-seed, or 3-seed did not advance to the Super Bowl. Los Angeles’ loaded roster pushed the team past Tom Brady and the Buccaneers in the N.F.C. Championship to reach the Super Bowl. Before facing the Bucs, they took down division-rival foes Arizona and San Francisco on the N.F.C. side of the bracket. The Rams were riding on a “Super Bowl or bust” year after acquiring quarterback Matthew Stafford from the Detroit Lions in exchange for quarterback Jared Goff, two first-round picks, and a third-round pick. Stafford has multiple weapons on the offensive side, highlighted by wide receiver Cooper Kupp. Kupp won the Offensive Player of the Year after gaining the second-most receiving yards in a season in N.F.L. history. He also won the receiving triple crown by leading the league in catches, receiving yards, and touchdown catches. Stafford’s offensive arsenal also includes wide receivers Odell Beckham Jr. and Van Jefferson. The ground game is led by running back Cam Akers, who added a spark to the offense in the second...
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 Parker O'Neal | Feb 13, 2022 | News Slider, Sports
NASHVILLE – The Lipscomb women’s basketball team fell to the Eastern Kentucky Colonels 82-69 Saturday afternoon at Allen Arena after giving up a large first-quarter lead. Scoring characterized the first quarter, as both teams shot over 50% from field goal range in the opening frame. Freshman forward Bella Vinson and sophomore guard Blythe Pearson scored back-to-back three pointers, followed by freshman Jordan Peete taking a charge on the defensive end. EKU fought back quickly, though. After a Bisons turnover, guard Ariel Kirkwood from EKU scored as the quarter ended to tie the game at 21-21. In the second quarter, Knoxville-native Casey Collier would make a tough floater shot to cut the lead to one point. However, the Colonels scored 27 points across the quarter while Lipscomb’s shooting percentage dropped. “I think the thing that really started to snowball for us was giving up second chance points,” assistant coach Chris Sumski said. “I think their length affected us a little bit.” Maddie Cook, a redshirt junior from Belmont, disrupted what would have been a wide-open EKU layup after a turnover by putting up a strong block. Despite Cook’s defensive play and Pearson’s 13 points, though, the Bisons trailed 48-33 at half. Midway through the third quarter, the Bisons cut the lead to 56-45 thanks to sophomore Jalyn Holcomb’s back-to-back shots from behind the arc. Peete also replicated Holcomb’s performance with a pair of consecutive threes of her own. The margin was stretched to a game-high 22 points in the fourth quarter when Italy native Alice Recanti scored in the paint for EKU. The Bisons were not able to create a spark on...
