The Samford women’s basketball team gained a measure of recovery at Timmons Arena from its men’s misadventures the night before by claiming a 66-60 victory over Furman on Thursday night.

Kennedy Langham scored 26 points for the Bulldogs. The freshman guard connected on 9/17 shots, which she combined with nine rebounds and three steals.

Down 14 points without about six minutes left, the Paladins got as close as four in a final minute riddled with whistles and fouls. Furman’s desperation press took a toll on the Bulldogs, who nonetheless won their third consecutive Southern Conference game.

It was Furman’s first SoCon game at home but the Paladins’ third loss in a row.

Niveya Henley paced Furman with 13 points and Sydney Ryan finished with 11 points.

Samford grabbed the lead late in the first quarter and never trailed thereafter.

Timmons Arena took on two waves of Bulldogs, but the Furman women couldn’t do to Samford what the men could. Samford won in spite of going without a field goal in the game’s final 5:33.

Less than a minute in, Jada Session limped off with an injury after being called for charging on Furman’s first possession. After a visit with trainers, she was back on court before the end of the quarter. The Paladins committed seven turnovers and trailed, 15-10.

Samford scored 14 points off 12 Furman turnovers in the first half, which ended with the Bulldogs ahead, 29-24. Tate Walters committed her third foul with just under a minute to go. It would’ve been worse had not Sydney James dropped a triple at the buzzer.

The Bulldogs outscored the Paladins 14-6 in the paint. Furman (11-9, 1-3 SoCon) hit 5/12 three pointers but only 3/12 inside the arc. It didn’t hurt that Samford (11-9, 3-2) converted 2/10 free throws.

The Sydneys, Ryan and James, each dropped two first-half triples.

The Paladins opened the second half with baskets from Henley and Kate Johnson to trim Samford’s lead to 29-28.

Samford finished the period with a 6-0 run on a pair of baskets by Langham and a follow by Bowman for a 47-38 advantage.

Furman trailed 55-41 with six minutes to go in the contest before battling back.

The Paladins’ shooting waned in the second half, but a press gave Samford fits in the final moments. Three free throws by Ryan put Furman within four points, 62-58, with 26.6 seconds on the clock.

The Bulldogs shot .439 percent from the field (25/57) and drained 5/10 triple attempts, compensated for 11/24 work at the free-throw line.

Furman, meanwhile, hit on .351 percent of its shots (20/57), including 6/21 attempts from three-point range.

Sadie Stetson tallied 12 points, and Samford got six blocks from 6-5 center Emily Bowman.

The Bulldogs made Furman pay dearly for a number of early-game turnovers, at one point building an 18-3 edge in points off miscues before the Paladins flipped the script, cutting the differential to 19-15 by the end of the contest.

Take a look at the stats here.

Long snapper Julian Ashby has been named a 2023 NCAA Division I Football Academic All-American, as selected by the College Sports Communicators (CSC).

Ashby, a December 2023 summa cum laude graduate with a 3.96 grade point average in physics, was a first-team selection to the squad, which covers all of NCAA Division I — both the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) and Football Championship Subdivision (FCS).

He is the 16th Furman football player to collect Academic All-America honors, tops among all Southern Conference schools.

The Lilburn, Ga., product made Phil Steele All-America following an outstanding career that saw him handle snapping duties for all Furman PATs, field goals, and punts over the last four seasons, successfully executing 412 snaps while working with a pair of All-SoCon punters and an all-conference placekicker.

Furman track and field teams will compete at Clemson’s Bob Pollock Invitational on Friday and Saturday, while select members of the team will run at the 12th annual Camel City Elite Races Saturday at the JDL Fast Track in Winston-Salem, N.C.

On Friday at Clemson, Furman will compete in the men’s 60m dash, the men’s and women’s mile and the women’s 5,000m.  Saturday’s events include the men’s 200m, men’s and women’s 800m, men’s and women’s 3,000m, and the women’s 4x400m relay. Action begins at 12:25 p.m. on Friday with the women’s 5,000m.  Saturday’s meet starts at 12:10 p.m. with the running of the women’s 800m.

A league-high 62 Furman athletes made the Southern Conference Fall Academic All-Conference Team,.
A conference-record 443 student-athletes were named to the team, comprised of representatives from men’s and women’s cross country, football, men’s and women’s soccer, and volleyball.

Indoor track and field athlete Megan Marvin is Southern Conference Student-Athlete of the Week for all competition from Jan. 17-23.

Marvin competed at the Carolina Challenge in Columbia, S.C., on Saturday, where she won the women’s 800m by three seconds with a time of 2:09.63. Her time leads the SoCon and ranks 33rd nationally in the event.

A senior from Chapel Hill, N.C., Marvin is pursuing a degree in mathematics-economics and holds a 3.94 GPA.

Women’s soccer has added six prep standouts to its 2024 roster, according to Paladin head coach Andrew Burr.

Dylan Daniels (Kennesaw, Ga.), Reese DeJong (Huntersville, N.C.), Bella Murphy (Tampa, Fla.), Sarah Sexton (Fort Mill), Jaleah Simmons (Duncan) and Kaitlyn Urbanek (Oxford, Miss.) will join Southern Wesleyan University transfer Vivianna Gutierrez (Statesboro, Ga.) and University of Tennessee transfer Tara Katz (Montgomery, Ala.) as newcomers for the Paladins next season.
Men’s tennis remains at home Friday to host the Bellarmine Knights and North Greenville Crusaders in a doubleheader at Mickel Tennis Center.
The Paladins are set to face Bellarmine at 3 p.m., followed by North Greenville at 7:30 p.m.

Furman’s Carson Williams and Sierra Bower are Southern Conference men’s and women’s indoor track athletes of the week, respectively.

Freshman Leonardo Dal Boni is Southern Conference Men’s Tennis Player of the Week for matches played January 16-22.

A native of Sarasota, Fla., Dal Boni posted an unbeaten 2-0 record at No. 2 singles.

Women’s lacrosse was picked third in the Big South Preseason Poll, while senior defender Katelyn Sousa earned Preseason Defensive Player of the Year honors.

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