UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. – The Penn State women's basketball team welcomes St. Francis (Pa.) for a Central Pennsylvania showdown Monday night. Tipoff is slated for 6 p.m. inside the Bryce Jordan Center.
FOLLOW ALONG
- Video ($): BTN-Plus
- Listen: Penn State Sports Network with Justin Antweil and Joe Putnam – 93.3 FM, 1390 AM and online
- Live Stats: Live stats
- Game Notes: Penn State Notes | St. Francis Notes
- Digital Program: Digital Program
OPENING TIPS
- Penn State squares off against St. Francis (Pa.) for a Central PA showdown Monday night inside the Bryce Jordan Center.
- Penn State looks to ride the momentum from its 84-45 season-opening win over Coppin State Wednesday night. Four Lady Lions scored in double figures, while seven tallied eight or more points in the balanced offensive attack.
- Freshman Tova Sabel led PSU with 14 points, while graduate transfer Kelly Jekot (11 points, 11 rebounds) and sophomore Anna Camden (13 points, 10 rebounds) recorded double-doubles. Sophomore Makenna Marisa scored 12 points and dished a career-high seven assists.
IF PENN STATE BEATS ST. FRANCIS
- Penn State would start the season 2-0 for the first time since 2017-18.
- The Lady Lions would improve to 7-1 all-time against St. Francis (Pa.)
SCOUTING THE OPPOSITION
- St. Francis (Pa.) will be playing its second of two-straight games against Big Ten opponents when the Red Flash travel to Happy Valley Monday night. SFU opened its season Friday against Michigan State, falling to the Spartans by a score of 77-44.
- Lili Benzel led St. Francis with 10 points, while Karson Swogger tallied nine points and a team-best four assists.
- The Red Flash shot just 18.8 percent (3-for-16) from three-point range and committed 26 turnovers in Friday's season opener against Michigan State.
- Saint Francis returns a core of nine experienced players from the 2019-20 roster, including three seniors who won a Northeast Conference Championship as freshmen in 2017-18. The Red Flash finished the 2019-20 season with an 11-19 overall mark and 9-9 record in NEC play.
- SFU is led by second-year head coach Keila Whittington, who was an assistant coach and recruiting coordinator at Penn State from 2001-07. Whittington helped guide the Lady Lions to an NCAA Elite Eight and two Sweet Sixteens during that time.
AGAINST THE RED FLASH
- Penn State and St. Francis (Pa.) will be meeting for the eighth time and first since 2013.
- The Lady Lions own a 6-1 advantage in the all-time series.
- The teams last met in 2013 at the Bryce Jordan Center when Penn State won 117-77. The 117 points are the second-highest in program history.
CENTRAL PA SHOWDOWN
- Penn State and St. Francis (Pa.) are separated by 63 miles and located just under an hour apart.
- The two Central PA teams have several connections. SFU head coach Keila Whittington was an assistant coach and recruiting coordinator at Penn State from 2001-07. Whittington helped guide the Lady Lions to an NCAA Elite Eight and two Sweet Sixteens during that time.
- Lady Lion all-time great Susan Robinson Fruchtl was the athletic director at St. Francis from 2016-2020 who hired Whittington before retiring from her position in March 2020. Robinson Fruchtl was the head coach of the women's basketball team at SFU from 2007-2012 prior to her role as AD and guided the Red Flash to back-to-back NEC titles in 2010 and 2011.
- Robinson was a 1992 first-team All-American at Penn State and the 1992 Wade Trophy National Player of the Year. She is Penn State's third all-time leading scorer and second all-time leading rebounder who amassed career marks of 2,253 points and 1,070 rebounds.
SEASON-OPENING WIN
- Penn State opened the 2020-21 season in style Wednesday night with a dominant 84-45 win over Coppin State at the Bryce Jordan Center. Penn State recorded its largest margin of victory (39 points) in over four years. It was Penn State's largest margin of victory since a 56-point win over Saint Peter's on Nov. 3, 2016.
- Seven Lady Lions finished with eight or more points as freshman Tova Sabel led the way with 14 points. Graduate transfer Kelly Jekot made her first appearance in a Penn State uniform and scored her 1,000th career point while recording her second career double-double with 11 points and 11 rebounds. Sophomore Anna Camden tallied her first career double-double with 13 points and 10 rebounds. Sophomore Makenna Marisa added 12 points and a team-best seven assists.
DOUBLE-DOUBLE TROUBLE
- Graduate student Kelly Jekot (11 points, 11 rebounds) and sophomore Anna Camden (13 points, 10 rebounds) both recorded double-doubles in Penn State's season-opening win over Coppin State.
- It marked the first time that two Lady Lions recorded double-doubles in the same game since Dec. 20, 2017 when Teniya Page (19 points, 13 rebounds) and Alisia Smith (10 points, 10 rebounds) did so at American.
- Wednesday's performance was Jekot's second career double-double and the first of Camden's young career.
DEPTH ON DISPLAY
- Penn State's bench combined to score 35 points in Wednesday's season-opening win over Coppin State. It marked the most points scored by the PSU bench since Nov. 30, 2019 when the Lady Lion reserves scored 43 in a 92-68 win against N.C. Central.
SWEDISH SENSATION
- Freshman Tova Sabel, a Stockholm, Sweden native, kicked off her collegiate and American career in style as Penn State's leading scorer with 14 points in Wednesday's season-opening win over Coppin State.
- Sabel shot 60 percent (6-for-10) from the floor en route to her 14 points, while also adding five rebounds and an assist.
- Prior to Penn State, Sabel was a four-year member of the Swedish National Team and named the Most Valuable Player of the U19 European League in 2019.
A PSU DEBUT TO REMEMBER
- Graduate transfer Kelly Jekot scored her 1,000th career point in her first game in a Penn State uniform during Wednesday night's season-opening win.
- Jekot scored 990 points during her three years at Villanova from 2016-2019. She transfered to Penn State in January 2020 and sat out the 2019-2020 season with an injury.
- Jekot scored her 11th point of the game, and 1,001st of her career, with a layup at the third-quarter buzzer.
UP NEXT
- Penn State remains home to host Rhode Island Thursday night at the Bryce Jordan Center. Tipoff is set for 6 PM.