FORT MYERS, Fla. – Florida Gulf Coast University women's basketball prepares to battle No. 7 Austin Peay in the Atlantic Sun Conference semifinal round Tuesday at Alico Arena.
Tuesday's semifinal tip is scheduled for 7 p.m. on ESPN+. FGCU outlasted No. 9 Jacksonville 76-69 on Saturday to survive and advance past the Dolphins. Austin Peay, the lowest remaining seed, upset No. 2 Stetson 49-45 to move on and face the Eagles. No. 3 Central Arkansas takes on No. 5 Eastern Kentucky in the other semifinal game, both winners advancing to the championship game on Saturday, March 12.
The ASUN Player of the Year Emani Jefferson and ASUN First Team member Uju Ezeudu offset Jacksonville's comeback hopes Saturday after witnessing a 24-point lead shrink to a two-possession game late. Ezeudu produced a team-leading 20 points and 12 boards, and Jefferson finished with 19 points by hitting three crucial free throws down the stretch.
FGCU is 3-0 all-time when facing Austin Peay. Behind Jefferson's 23 points in January, FGCU walked away with an 11-point road victory (65-54) over the Governors. Austin Peay will be making just their third-ever trip down to Fort Myers for Tuesday's showdown, the first meeting between the two programs in the ASUN Tournament.
The Eagles are 34-2 all-time in the ASUN Tournament and have reached to the ASUN championship game each season since gaining postseason eligibility in 2011-12.
Last week, Jefferson was named the ASUN's Player, Defensive and Newcomer of the Year. Jefferson is the only Eagle in the program's history to win all three awards in the same season. Ezeudu earned ASUN All-First Team honors, while Maddie Antenucci landed on the ASUN All-Academic Team. Dolly Cairns is five points away from 1,000 career points.
FGCU won its seventh consecutive ASUN regular season crown this season to earn the tournament's top seed, posting a perfect 16-0 record in the ASUN play. The Green and Blue won all 16 regular season conference games by double digits for an average spread of 24.5 points.
Currently, on a 20-game win streak, the Eagles have notched 27 wins. Only FGCU and UConn have recorded 14 consecutive seasons of 25 or more victories.
NOTES
- Head coach Karl Smesko has built and engineered the program's historic ascension within the women's college basketball world with its #Raining3s attack, leading the nation in made threes per game the last four seasons. FGCU holds the NCAA record for the most made threes in a single season, sinking 431 during the 2017-18 campaign. This season, the Eagles are third nationally in 3-point attempts per game, averaging 29.7 attempts per game. Of those attempts, FGCU is knocking down 9.3 threes per contest, ranking eighth in the nation.
- The Eagles soared up to No. 2 overall in the latest CollegeInsider.com's Mid Major Top 25 Poll for the second connective week and have received votes in the Associated Press Poll twice this season after knocking off No. 18 North Carolina in the Gulf Coast Showcase - the seventh Top 25 win in the program's history. The Green and Blue has finished in the AP Top 25 in five out of the last six seasons. During the last four campaigns, FGCU is the only mid-major program with four straight AP Top 25 finishes.
- FGCU, South Carolina, Stanford and UConn are the only four Division I programs to record 30 or more wins in three of the last five seasons. The Eagles went 33-4 a season ago, winning their 13th ASUN regular season title and ninth ASUN Tournament Championship, along with capturing their fourth-ever NCAA Tournament First Round victory. FGCU is the winningest 12th seed in NCAA Tournament history.
- With an all-time win percentage of .845, the Green and Blue entered into the 2023-24 season as the winningest program in the history of women's college basketball. FGCU earned 10 of the 12 first-place votes in the 2023-24 ASUN Preseason Coaches Poll and 38 of the possible 40 first-place votes in the ASUN Preseason Media Poll.
- Smesko's career win percentage of .831 (670-136) has him positioned as the third-winningest active Division I head coach, just behind UConn's Geno Auriemma and LSU's Kim Mulkey. In 2021, FGCU shocked the LSU Tigers in Baton Rouge 88-74. Smesko was named to Her Hoops Stats' 2024 preseason watch list for the Kathy Delaney-Smith Mid-Major Coach of the Year Award. Smekso has produced 20 straight 20-win seasons with the Green and Blue dating back to 2004-05, and reached win No. 600 at FGCU on January 31 of this year with a win over Bellarmine. Smesko has also guided the Eagles to 14 consecutive 25-plus win seasons, an accomplishment only achieved by UConn and FGCU.
- Redshirt junior Emani Jefferson was named a semifinalist for the 2024 Becky Hammon Mid Major Player of the Year Award. Kierstan Bell won the honor in 2021 and 2022. FGCU is the only program with three players named semifinalists in the award's short four-year history, as Jefferson now joins Bell and Keri Jewett-Giles.
