Staff report

SALISBURY — Revenge is a strong motivator, and Catawba’s women’s basketball team couldn’t match Georgia Southwestern’s intensity nor its shooting accuracy on Saturday.

The Indians, ranked 17th nationally, were blown out 88-63 in a Southeast Regional semifinal. Georgia Southwestern removed any mystery about the ultimate outcome with a dominant 21-6 second quarter.

Catawba’s 34-game home winning streak, the longest in the nation was shattered emphatically by the Hurricanes from Americus, Ga.

Georgia Southwestern had been beaten by Catawba (24-6) in a 2023 regional final that also was played in Goodman Arena. Catawba also had prevailed against GSW on a road trip early this season. But this time it was no contest. Georgia Southwestern shot 54 percent to Catawba’s 33 percent and took care of the basketball, making only 12 turnovers. Catawba thrives on forcing turnovers, but GSW got more points off turnovers than Catawba did.

GSW received 27 points from Jashanti Simmons and 20 from Kayla Langley.

Georgia Southwestern (28-3) went 16-2 in the Peach Belt Conference, won the PBC Tournament and is ranked 11th nationally, but was only seeded fifth for the Southeast Regional, behind four SAC teams. Georgia Southwestern edged fourth-seeded Lenoir-Rhyne in overtime in the first round and will play another SAC team, second-seeded Carson-Newman, for the regional championship at Goodman Arena at 7 p.m. on Monday night. Carson-Newman beat familiar foe Anderson in the semis.

GSW held Catawba star Lyrik Thorne to eight points on 3-for-12 shooting in the final game of her long and amazing career. Thorne surpassed the 2,000-point threshold in her fifth season and finished as the leading scorer in Catawba history. She was a two-time SAC Player of the Year and Regional Player of the Year. South Rowan’s all-time leading scorer Janiya Downs and consistent post player Sara McIntosh arrived in the same class as Thorne, and both were 1,000-point scorers for the Indians.

It’s a class that went 110-29 and a class that will be remembered. Recruited by Terrence Baxter, who is now at North Carolina Central, the three graduate students played most of their careers for coach Terence McCutcheon.

GSW’s Hurricanes got off to a strong start on Saturday and led 24-12 after a quarter.

Catawba has started slowly before, so fans expected a second-quarter rally, but that didn’t happen. By halftime, the deficit had snowballed to 45-18, and GSW wasn’t letting up. It was 51-19 after GSW began the second half with another flurry.

McIntosh scored 20 points before fouling out. Downs had a strong shooting game in her final college outing, going 5-for-7 on 3s and scoring 17 points.

Janiya Foskey contributed eight points and seven rebounds.

GSW               24     21     18    25   —   88

Catawba        12        6     18    27    — 63

GSW — Simmons 27, Langley 20, Ndukwe 18, Garrett 13, Tomlin 9, McCully 1.

CATAWBA — McIntosh 20, Downs 17, Thorne 8, Foskey 8, Dixon-Booker 4, Spry 2, Porter 2, Baker 2,