Box Score
SALISBURY, NC – Senior forward Brittany Wright reached 1,000 career points Monday as she scored a game-high 21 points as the Livingstone women's basketball team defeated the Fayetteville State University Broncos 73-67.
With 8:07 left in the second half, and the Blue Bears trailing 55-54, Wright hit a jumper in the lane and was fouled giving Livingstone a 56-55 lead. Wright converted the three-point play to give the Blue Bears a 57-55 edge and making her career point total 1,001.
Wright led the Blue Bears with 21 points and tied for the team lead in rebound with nine. Kelcyn Manurs and Rashida Elbourne each also added 18 points and Manurs pulled down nine boards. Manurs also recorded seven assists.
The whole game was a back and forth battle with the lead changing hands 14 times and the score being tied 16 times. Livingstone grabbed an early 6-3 lead, but throughout the entirety of the first half neither team amassed more than a four-point advantage. The Blue Bears led by four with 55 seconds left in the opening half, but Fayetteville closed the half on a 5-1 run to tie the game at 37-37 at the half.
Fayetteville State came out as the aggressor to start the second half, grabbing the first four points in the first 44 seconds of the half. The Broncos continued to lead by two with 18:03 left, but the Blue Bears went on a 5-0 run to take a 46-43 lead with 15:41 on the clock. Livingstone increased its lead to seven points with 13:06 left, but Fayetteville rattled off a 10-0 run to take a 55-52 lead with 9:26 left in the game.
Wright gave Livingstone a 57-55 lead with 8:07 left and while Fayetteville was able to tie the game, the Broncos never regained a lead. Fayetteville tied the game with 5:18 left, but a 8-1 Livingstone run gave the Blue Bears a 68-61 edge with 3:45 remaining. The Blue Bears led by as much as eight points before holding on for the 73-67 victory.
Both teams struggled shooting the ball in the second half. Livingstone shot 36.1 percent for the game but only 25.8 percent in the second half while Fayetteville shot 25 percent in the second half and 33.8 percent for the game. The Blue Bears shot 33.3 percent from three-point range and 71.9 percent at the charity stripe.
Livingstone will host Johnson C. Smith on Saturday at 5:30 p.m. in its final home contest of the season. The Blue Bears are in a must-win situation to improve their tournament seeding. Should the Blue Bears fall to the Golden Bulls they will be the fifth seed from the Southern Division in the tournament.
If the Blue Bears defeat Johnson C. Smith their seeding will be determined based on the outcome of the Shaw-St. Augustine's contest from Thursday evening. With a Livingstone win, the loser of the Shaw-St. Augustine's contest will fall into a tie in the division with the Blue Bears. If Livingstone is tied with Shaw then the Blue Bears would receive the fourth seed based on overall conference record after the first tiebreaker of head-to-head is bypassed. If Livingstone is tied with St. Augustine's then the fourth seed will come down to a coin flip after the head-to-head results are even and the overall conference records are even.
