The Monroe Golden Tornadoes will face off against the Carver Tigers at 7:00 p.m. on Friday. Both squads will be entering this one on the heels of a big victory.
Winning is just a little bit easier when you work as a team to rack up nine more assists than your opponent, a fact Monroe proved on Friday. They blew past Columbus 64-29 on the road. Given Monroe's advantage in MaxPreps' Georgia basketball rankings (they are ranked 92nd, while Columbus is ranked 332nd), the result wasn't entirely unexpected.
Monroe relied on the efforts of Ciarra Lunsford, who dropped a double-double on 24 points and 13 rebounds, and Kie'Aundria Acree, who shot 5-for-8 from long range and dropped a triple-double on 26 points, 12 rebounds, and ten assists. That makes it four consecutive games in which Acree has scored at least a third of Monroe's points. Another player making a difference was Glendalys Harvey, who scored four points along with nine rebounds.
Meanwhile, Carver had already won seven in a row (a stretch where they outscored their opponents by an average of 34.3 points), and they went ahead and made it eight on Wednesday. They claimed a resounding 79-23 victory over Thomasville at home. Carver pushed the score to 71-19 by the end of the third, a deficit Thomasville had no chance of recovering from.
Aubri Wilkins continued her habit of posting crazy stat lines, scoring 17 points along with four steals. She is on a roll when it comes to steals, as she's now grabbed two or more in the last six games she's played. Jazmin Thornton was another key contributor, scoring 13 points along with six rebounds.
Monroe has been performing well recently as they've won 11 of their last 13 contests, which provided a nice bump to their 17-8 record this season. As for Carver, they pushed their record up to 19-6 with that win, which was their seventh straight at home.
This contest is one where the number of possessions is likely to be a big factor: Monroe have been smashing the glass this season, having averaged 33.4 rebounds per game. However, it's not like Carver struggles in that department as they've been averaging 26.5 rebounds per game. Given these competing strengths, it'll be interesting to see how their clash plays out.
Monroe might still be hurting after the 69-44 defeat they got from Carver in their previous meeting last Tuesday. That match was all but decided by halftime, at which point Monroe was down 38-18.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps
