With October soon to draw to a close, its basketball time as the University of Evansville women’s basketball team opens a new season with an exhibition with Kentucky Wesleyan on Sunday afternoon at 1 p.m. inside Meeks Family Fieldhouse.
The Purple Aces will feature six returning student-athletes and seven newcomers for the 2018-19 season. Returning for Evansville is 55% of its offense from a year ago, including its top-scorer in senior Kerri Gasper who led the Aces in five statistical categories last year; points per game (13.1), rebounds per game (5.7), assists per game (3.1), steals per game (1.1), and free-throw percentage (92.3%). As a team, Evansville earned the NCAA statistical championship for team free-throw shooting percentage, hitting 82.0% (347-423) of its attempts at the charity stripe last season
Back for the Aces in 2018-19 is redshirt senior guard Brooke Bishop, who missed 21 games last season. The Warsaw, Ky. native was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis just past the midway point of the 2017-18 season, but has worked her way back and joins a senior class of three for Evansville that includes Gasper and Tattenai Hall. To begin the season, Bishop was the team’s best three-point shooter, hitting 40.0% from beyond the arc. Bishop’s return will also add scoring pop to the Aces’ lineup as Bishop averaged 11.8 points per contest a season ago. The returners are joined by a talented group of newcomers to this Purple Aces’ squad. Three newcomers earned all-state honors in their respective states last season as seniors as Anna Newman and Sydney Tucker both earned the honor in Indiana, while Tayzha Buck was named all-state in Minnesota.
