How absurdly balanced is the Southland Conference in women’s basketball?

Heading into the second weekend of league play, only two teams remain unbeaten.

McNeese State (8-5, 2-0) is one of them, though the Cowgirls will need to pick up their first road win of the season at Texas A&M-Corpus Christi today to stay in that company.

“I don’t know that we’ve played poorly on the road,” said coach Brooks Donald Williams. “We just haven’t executed for 40 minutes like we need to. It’s certainly tougher to play on the road than at home. But I think the more we travel, the more comfortable we will be on the road.”

The Cowgirls will want to play better than they did in Monday night’s 60-57 win over Houston Baptist, which required overcoming a sluggish start before rallying late.

“We didn’t play well, and Houston Baptist had something to do with that, but we still kept playing,” Donald Williams said. “Two weeks ago we weren’t mature enough to play through that many mistakes. We’re a different team.”

The Islanders (5-8, 1-1) are capping off an unusual week of scheduling that sees them playing their third game since Tuesday night while McNeese has been idle since Monday.

That certainly has the potential to play in McNeese’s hands in terms of energy and employing the full-court press.

“We’re going to come out pressing whether it’s their first game this week or third,” Donald Williams said. “It gets this team going. We intend to press as much as we can. It is certainly something that gives us energy right off the bat regardless of their schedule this week.”

Donald Williams said the Cowgirls will be without freshman starting center Frederica Haywood, who will be absent due to a family funeral. Fellow freshman Ann Nwosah will take her place in the lineup.

(Rick Hickman/American Press)

Rick Hickman