COMMERCE – The tenth-ranked Texas A&M University-Commerce women's basketball team splits home and away in back-to-back games against the Texas Woman's University Pioneers starting Thursday night. The Lions will travel to Denton, Texas to play on Saturday and times are set for 5 p.m. and 2 p.m., respectively.
 
WHO: Texas Woman's at A&M-Commerce, A&M-Commerce at Texas Woman's
WHERE: Commerce, Texas | The Field House; Denton, Texas | Kitty Magee Arena
WHEN: 5 p.m. on Thursday, 2 p.m. on Saturday
RECORDS: A&M-Commerce (8-1, 8-0) and TWU (3-4, 3-3)
RANKINGS: A&M-Commerce sits at No. 10 in the polls while TWU remains unranked.

TELEVISION/LIVE VIDEO: LSC Digital Network
LIVE AUDIO: Lion Sports Network -- KETR 88.9 FM, Commerce (http://www.ketr.org)
LIVE STATS: http://statbroadcast.com/events/statmonitr.php?gid=tame
TICKETS: PASS LIST ONLY
 
Going into the year… 
A&M-Commerce (8-1, 8-0) is led by seventh-year head coach Jason Burton and comes off a record-setting 2019-20 season with a lions' share of firsts for the program. The defending LSC Coach of the Year and his staff led the Lions to a program-high 28-3 record along with the first 20-win Lone Star Conference season for the program. The end of this successful run is one the Lions and their fans will wonder "what could have been" after CoVID-19 brought an abrupt end to the postseason.
 
The Lions maintain a roster with a mix of new faces and experienced ones. Two returning starters are at the forefront, with a duo of double-digit scoring guards in WBCA Honorable Mention Third All-American WBCA and All-LSC Second Teamer Chania Wright (Desoto), and LSC Freshman of the Year and Third Team All-Conference selection Juliana Louis (Long Beach, Calif.).  
 
The latest… 
TAMUC is currently riding a four-game win streak that dates back to the 89-71 road victory over Cameron, Thursday Jan. 14. In those four games the Lions scored no less than 71 all while hitting the second-highest scoring mark in the LSC this season in the win over Cameron. No team has surpassed the 71-point plateau against them in their current run that includes a midweek 76-70 win over Arkansas-Fort Smith and a road sweep over the Angelo State Rambelles. In that series, Dyani Robinson (Cypress) earned her second LSC Offensive Player of the Week honors averaging 21.5 points per game. In the Saturday game, she scored 21 points with five rebounds and two assists, and on Sunday she scored 22 points with six rebounds and three assists. That was Robinson's fourth 20-point performance of the season. DesiRay Kernal (Newton, Kan.) has held steady to her No. 3 spot in the scoring rankings in the conference, putting in 16.0 per game. Robinson leads the squad scoring 20.2 per game but does not qualify in the LSC scoring leader board. A&M-Commerce sits atop the North Division while finding themselves No. 4 in the South Central Regional rankings.
 
Notes to consider… 
After making their second top-10 appearance in the polls this week, A&M-Commerce gets set to play their third North Division rival of the season against the Pioneers this weekend and look to build on their four-game win streak. For the majority of the year, the Lions have held the top spot in the offensive scoring category averaging 77.4 points per game. TAMUC's second-leading bucket getter is a top-3 scorer in the record books, but the Lions have three others also contributing points in the double figures each time out.
 
The Aforementioned Robinson and Kernal lead the squad with 20.2 and 16.0 respectively, while Wright adds 11.6 per game and Louis scores 10.5 points per contest. The LSC's top stat leaders in various categories are littered with women in the blue and gold. Kernal is third in field goal percentage (48-of-94, 51.1 percent) and Wright is efficient and hits more shots than others from beyond the arc, ranking ninth in three-point efficiency and is just outside the top-10 in three pointers made per game. She also has quick hands, grabbing 2.7 steals per game. That number is good for seventh in the conference. The Lions have a post presence that ranks in the top-10 in blocked shots per game, Agang Tac (Garland) in sixth with 1.2. The matchup down low to watch will be Kernal, who ranks eighth in the LSC with 6.6 rebounds per game and TWU's Ma'K'La Woods, who is sixth with 7.7 per contest.
 
On the opponent…
The Texas Woman's Pioneers (3-4, 3-3) finished last season with a 10-16 record, 8-14 mark in the LSC. Head coach Beth Jillson is in her 13^th year at the helm of the TWU program with an overall record of 180-167 (.519 win.percentage). The Fort Worth native became the all-time winningest coach in Pioneer basketball history on Dec. 13, 2011.
 
On the series history…
A&M-Commerce and Angelo State have met 59 times prior to the game on Thursday evening. The Lions own the series 32-27 and have won four-in-a-row and seven of the previous 10 matchups. TAMUC took the last game in blowout fashion, 76-46, in 2019.