STATESBORO, Ga. – Old Dominion women’s basketball led by six, 61-55 early in the fourth quarter, but Georgia Southern put together a 13-2 run and never looked back as the Monarch dropped their final game of the regular season, 86-79 on Friday night.
The late push by the Eagles (14-17, 6-12 Sun Belt) allowed them to jump ahead, 68-63 midway through the final stanza. A Mariah Clayton fastbreak layup finally snapped ODU’s scoring drought, but the hosts went up by double digits, 84-74 with 21 seconds left in the game. Clayton got to the line made a pair of late free throws and Simaru Fields hit a three-pointer with four seconds remaining to round out the scoring for the Monarchs (17-14, 9-9).
ODU got out to a slow start as the quickly found themselves down 11-3 midway through the opening quarter. Fields then made both of her shots at the charity stripe and Brenda Fontana followed with a jumper to trim the GS lead to 11-7 at the 3:49 mark. The Eagles then went back up by nine, 16-7, but a three from En’Dya Buford and a bucket by Simone Cunningham had the Monarchs trailing 16-12 at the end of the first.
The second quarter was pretty much a stalemate as ODU continued to get to the line and GS responded with layup after layup. The two teams went into the locker room with the score knotted at 34-34.
Down by a point, 45-44 with just over six minutes to play in the third, the Monarchs finally got some separation with a 6-0 run. Buford made good on an and-one opportunity, Cunningham made a free throw, and Buford followed with two more free throws to put ODU in front, 50-45. GS retook the lead with an 8-0 response, but an old-fashioned three-point play by Fontana opened up a 7-0 answer as Old Dominion regained control, 57-53. Buford then converted another two free throws as the Monarchs took a 59-55 lead into the fourth.
Buford scored 24 points on 3-for-4 shooting from the perimeter and an 11-for-14 effort at the free-throw line. She added six rebounds, four assists, and one steal to her totals. Cunningham finished with 17 points and seven boards with one steal, Fields had 14 points with three rebounds and four steals, and Thompson also reached double digits with 10 points.
ODU combined to shoot 26-for-58 (44.8%) from the floor, including 6-for-15 (40%) from deep, and 21-for-30 (70%) at the line. The Monarchs won the rebounding battle (36-28) and scored more second-chance points (16-1), but were held to just six points off the bench. The game featured 11 ties and 16 lead changes.
Old Dominion enters next week’s Sun Belt Championship as the No. 5 seed and will play Friday, March 7 at 12:30 p.m. EST. The conference tournament is being held at the Pensacola Bay Center in Pensacola, Florida with each game streamed on ESPN+. The Championship Final is set for Monday, March 10 at 2 p.m. EST and will air on either ESPN or ESPN 2. The winner will earn the league’s automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament.