BURSTROM NAMED SAC PLAYER OF THE WEEK

Carson-Newman freshman scored a career-high 24 points at Catawba last Wednesday

Carson-Newman freshman Tatum Burstrom (Maryville, Tenn.) earned South Atlantic Conference Women’s Basketball Player of the Week honors after a pair of sterling performances last week for the Lady Eagles.

The award is the first for Burstrom in her career, and the first SAC weekly honor for a Lady Eagle this season.

Burstrom started her award-winning week with a career-high 24-point performance at Catawba last Wednesday night. She knocked down a season-best six three-pointers in the victory as the Lady Eagles earned their first win inside Goodman Gymnasium since Jan. 21, 2006 as Carson-Newman won 60-59.

Burstrom was 7-for-13 shooting from the field and 6-for-10 from three-point land, in addition to going 4-for-5 at the free throw line in the narrow victory for the Lady Eagles. Making Burstrom’s performance against Catawba even more impressive was the fact that she did this after going 0-for-12 from the field and 0-for-9 from beyond the arc in Carson-Newman’s previous game at Anderson.

After getting off to a slow start by not scoring in Carson-Newman’s first half against Wingate, Burstrom scored 12 points and helped the Lady Eagles outscore the Bulldogs 39-24 in the final 20 minutes as Carson-Newman won 56-50 on Senior Day.

Against Wingate, Burstrom hit a pair of three-pointers and was a perfect 4-for-4 at the foul line in her final regular season game.

Burstrom leads the Lady Eagles in scoring by averaging 11.2 points per game and is second in the SAC in three-point percentage, making 38 percent of her shots from beyond the arc.

Carson-Newman will play its SAC Tournament quarterfinal game at fourth-seeded Newberry on Wednesday March 6 at 7 p.m. inside Eleazer Arena. The Lady Eagles and Wolves split both meetings this season, with each team winning on their home court. Carson-Newman held Newberry to a season-low 39 points in a 57-39 win on Jan. 12 in Jefferson City, while the Wolves won 75-66 on Feb. 16 in Newberry.

The winner of Wednesday’s quarterfinal matchup between Carson-Newman and Newberry will face the winner of top-seeded Anderson and eighth-seeded Lincoln Memorial in the semifinals at Timmons Arena in Greenville, S.C. on Saturday March 9 at noon. The championship game will be played on Sunday March 10 at 1:30 p.m. at Timmons Arena.

Coverage of all Carson-Newman games in the 2013 Food Lion SAC Women’s Basketball Championship will be available on www.cneagles.com as well as the Coca-Cola Eagle Sports Network.