Pacers can't keep up with powerhouse Nighthawks

Kyle Dawson, Aiken Standard, S.C.
·3 min read

Jan. 29—No. 6 NORTH GEORGIA 74, USC AIKEN 52

The theme of the season so far for the USC Aiken women's basketball team has been that it's a learning process.

That's to be expected from a roster of almost entirely freshmen — and the extra year of eligibility for several of them doesn't mean that much when the team only played seven games last season.

Game in and game out, there are lessons for this group of Pacers to learn as they try to figure out how to win.

Saturday they were dealt a harsh lesson from a powerhouse North Georgia team. The sixth-ranked Nighthawks shot 52.9% from the floor for the game in a 74-52 win at the Convocation Center.

"I thought we played hard and competed against a really good team. They should be No. 5 in the country and moving on the way up," said USCA head coach Mark Miller. "I thought the fact that we did some nice things, especially early — they're just a hard team for us to continue to match up with. They can do it all. They've got five kids who can score in double figures every night. ... They made a little adjustment defensively, then we didn't make an adjustment offensively. I think that hurt us a little bit."

Allycia Harris again barely missed out on a double-double with nine points and 10 rebounds, and she had four of the Pacers' nine steals. Chidinma Okafor had 13 points and six rebounds, Yasmine Fairchild scored eight points off the bench, and Jentri Worley scored seven.

The Pacers (7-10, 3-6 Peach Belt Conference) shot 32.2% from the floor and were just 3-for-11 from 3. They found some rhythm offensively in the second quarter when they shot 47.4% and scored 20 points — the only problem was the Nighthawks (16-1, 9-0) shot 75% and scored 28.

Caroline Martin led North Georgia in scoring with 28 points. She was one of three Nighthawks in double figures. North Georgia overcame 19 turnovers by hitting more than half its shot attempts, and the Nighthawks held a plus-12 advantage on the glass.

North Georgia led throughout and went up by as many as 30 points late in the fourth quarter.

Up next for USCA is a stretch of three consecutive road games, starting with a 5:30 p.m. tip Wednesday at Columbus State.

"One at a time. It's one at a time. That's the only way we can go about it and hope you get better," Miller said. "If you play this way and can put 40 minutes together like we did some today, you can have some success. It's a league that you better come every night ready to play and ready to compete. If you don't, you'll get your doors blown off. Whether you're on the road or at home, you've just got to come in and do things like that.