Troy women’s basketball drew the second seed and got a double bye for the conference tournament in Pensacola, Florida. The second seed would be the Trojan’s eighth straight season of being a fourth or higher seed for the conference tournament.
The Trojans faced the red-hot Ragin Cajuns of Louisiana in their first game of the tournament season. Louisiana kept its hot shooting alive to upset the Trojans.
“I’m mostly sad for our whole team and definitely our four seniors. I want to give Louisiana a ton of credit,” said head coach Chanda Rigby in an interview with Troy Athletics. “It’s tough to beat someone three times in a season, and we didn’t play like underdogs. However, they did.”
It was a back and fourth game that saw the Trojans miss a game-winning three to the upset-minded Ragin Cajuns. Despite the loss, Hollings still stuffed the stat sheet with 23 points and 12 rebounds.
Behind Hollings was senior guard Nia Daniels with 12 points, while senior guard Makayia Hallmon notched 10 points against her former team. The scoring output from the three seniors and the rest of the team led to the Trojans leading for 27 out of 32 total minutes.
The Trojans started out strong, outscoring Louisiana 24-14 and shooting 64.3% as a team. Daniels led the hot-handed Trojans in the first half with 12 points off 5-for-6 shooting.
The Trojans carried a five-point advantage into the half before the Ragin Cajuns’ came out firing on all cylinders in the second half, shooting 42.5 %from the field, forcing nine steals and swatting away five shots.
It was the third quarter that was the difference maker in the game, as Louisiana outscored the Trojans 21-13 including a 10-2 run to tie the game at 43 points. From that point on the Trojans and Cajuns traded leads back and forth.
The Cajuns pushed the lead to 50-57 to put Troy in a seven-point deficit before the Trojans went on a 10-2 run of their own to take the lead at 60-59. A Tai’Sheka Porchia free throw put the Trojans up 61-59, which would be the last time Troy would lead in the game.
The loss would be only the fourth loss against a conference opponent for the Trojans as they finished with 15 conference wins. This would not be the end of the season for Troy though, as the Trojans accepted an invite to play in the Women’s National Invitation Tournament.
The Trojans received a first-round bye for the WNIT before welcoming the winner of Stetson versus Florida International to Trojan Arena. The second-round game’s date and time has not been announced yet but will take place between March 23-26.
You can check for updates at troytrojans.com or by checking their X, formerly known as Twitter, account @TroyTrojansWBB.
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