FAIRFIELD, Conn. – As soon as the calendar turns to December, the Fairfield University women's basketball team will open up the biggest season of their campaign as they play in their first conference game. The December 1 date marks the earliest the Stags have ever opened up conference play and the first game of the slate brings them to Loudonville, N.Y., as the Stags take on the Siena Saints on Thursday at 7pm. Fairfield has won five-straight road games against the Saints and are looking to start their MAAC campaign 1-0 for the eighth time in the last nine years.
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT: The Stags are coming off their second-straight loss despite an impressive scoring performance by Kelsey Carey, who notched a season-high with 20 points. Carey guided the offense from the start of the game after tallying eight of the team's first nine points, and would eventually score nearly half of the team's 44 points and tallied 10 of the 20 field goals for the team. It was the second-straight 20 point outing for Carey against Harvard. On the defensive side, the Stags held one of the hottest shooting teams in the country in check for the game. Harvard entered the game ranked 12th in the country in both 3-pointers and 3-point percentage, but the Stags forced the Crimson to misfire on nine of their first 10 attempts from long range before finishing at a 4-for-16 clip. It was when Harvard made those shots, however, as the home side made one 3-pointer to end the third quarter and start the fourth to pull away. Besides Carey's 10-for-18 shooting, the rest of the Stags shot 10-for-41 in the loss.
CAREY-ING ON: Kelsey Carey is the only Stag to have scored in double figures in all six of the team's games, setting a new career-best with that streak. Carey has totaled 93 points through the first six games after pouring in 20 against Harvard. This stretch is the longest in Carey's career, breaking her previous mark set from January 24-February 12 last season. During that stretch, she recorded 87 points (17.4 per game), which is the most she has tallied during any five game stretch of her career. The streak was snapped on Feb., 12, 2016 after she posted just seven points in a home win against Saint Peter's. This is the longest double digit streak to begin a season for the Stags since Katie Cizynski reached double figures in seven-straight games to open the 2013-14 campaign.
THE SAINTS SCOUTING REPORT: The record for Siena might read 1-3, but the Siena Saints have shown the talent that they have to make a potential run in the MAAC this season. The offense has been built around thus far by the unbelievable play of Jackie Benitez, who has gotten off to one of the best starts of any player in the country. The guard is currently tied for the top spot in the Division I landscape with 5.0 3-pointers per contest. Her 20 3-pointers and .488 3-point shooting percentage has helped her rack up a conference best 24.3 points per game, ranking fourth in the country. Benitez is one of four Saints checking into Thursday's game in double figures with Kollyns Scarbrough (13.5), Meghan Donohue (11.8), and Denisha Petty-Evans (11.8) also eclipsing the double digit plateau. The one statistic that might be surprising for the Saints is that they currently check in with a -6.2 rebounding margins after being one of the better rebounding squads in the conference over the last several years. The Saints were pre-ranked third in the conference, just one spot higher than the Stags in the MAAC Preseason Poll.
UP NEXT: The Stags will continue MAAC play when they host the defending MAAC Champions Iona Gaels at home on Sunday at 2pm.
