Spartanburg, SC – After coming off of two loses to Chowan this past weekend, the Converse College Women's Basketball team returned home to face Erskine College on Monday night.  Still seeking their first Conference Carolinas victory of the season, the Valkyries were hoping that being back in Hannah Gymnasium would give them the spark they needed to bounce back into the win column.  While Erskine leads the overall series 20-6, Converse had won the last 3 out of 5 games between the two schools.  They were looking to add to that win total and come away with their second home win of the season.

Converse controlled the jump ball, at the beginning of the first quarter, and they quickly went to work.  Sierra Davenport put the Valkyries on the board first with a second chance put back, to take a quick 2-0 lead.  After Erskine tied things up, Keyshuna Fair, this week's Converse Athlete of the Week, picked up right where she left off from this weekend by hitting her first of four straight 3-pointers.  Her shooting, along with stingy defense from Tierney Porter on Erskine's leading scorer Osha Makerson, quickly saw the Valkyries with a 17-5 lead.  Another Converse 3-pointer from Ellen Nardella, put them up 20-9 and that is how the quarter would come to an end.

Fair continued her scoring as she converted an outside jumper to start the second quarter.  A free throw from Sierra Davenport and a FG from Eva Carballo, pushed the Valkyries' lead to 14 points, 25-11.  Porter continued her lock down defense on Makerson, as she was unable to get anything going.  In fact, she was only able to score three points, all from free throws, in the first two quarters.  Ayanna Parker entered the game for Converse and was able to score four points off of turnovers and with two more free throws from Sierra Davenport, the half ended with the Valkyries leading Erskine, by a score of 31-14.

The third quarter saw Converse stretch its lead to 19 points, after two Jordan Brown free throws.  Eventually the Valkyries had a 40-20 lead, after Lindsey Hardin converted a 3-point play.  Erskine would continue to shuffle players in and out of the game to try to slow down the Converse scoring, but they were unable to trim the lead.  Hardin forced a turnover and found Carballo down the court for a fast break layup, forcing an Erskine timeout.  As play resumed, Nardella drew an Erskine foul, resulting in 2 made free throws.  That is all the scoring they would need to finish the quarter, with their biggest lead of the game at 25 points, 48-23.

The fourth quarter would be much different than the previous three.  Erskine slowly chipped away at the Valkyries lead and at the first media timeout, Converse's lead had been trimmed to 16, 50-34.  It would stay that way until around 3 minutes left in the game, when Erskine forced a turnover and converted a 3-point play, to cut the lead to 12 points.  After a shot clock violation by the Valkyries, Erskine found themselves only down by single digits, 58-50.  Free throws from Porter and Fair stopped the Erskine run for a second, but they would score a 3-pointer and add two free throws, to get within 7 points, with 31 seconds remaining in the game.  Converse's defense stepped up and was able to grab defensive rebounds and convert at the free throw line, and as the horn sounded, they would come away with their first Conference Carolinas win of the season, 64-55.

For the third game in a row, Keyshuna Fair set a career high in scoring.  In tonight's game, she led the Valkyries in scoring with 22 points.  She also continued her dominance on the boards grabbing a total of 14 rebounds (3 offensive and 11 defensive).  Lindsey Hardin turned in another solid performance, finishing with 15 points, 3 rebounds and 3 assists.  Sierra Davenport chipped in with 8 points and 7 rebounds, while Jordan Brown had 9 rebounds of her own.  Converse will return to action this Thursday Jan. 28^th when they travel to Bristol, TN to face King University in a Conference Carolinas match-up.  Tip-off is scheduled for 6:00pm.