The Eastern women’s basketball team faces a must-win situation as it is on the second game of a three-game road trip.

This time the Panthers head to Clarksville, Tenn. to take on the Austin Peay Governors who defeated Eastern on Jan. 24 in Lantz Arena.

Eastern and Austin Peay are tied in the standings at 5-6 in the conference.

Panther coach Debbie Black has stated multiple reasons why this game is a must-win game for her team.

“Number one and foremost, we want to make the tournament,” she said. “Secondly, we want to get as high of a seed as we can.  It is really one game at a time. Since they stole one here from us, we need to steal one back.”

Tiasha Gray proved to be a problem for the Panthers in the game a couple weeks ago.

“Gray is a special player,” she said. “You want her to take 25 shots to get her 20-something points. Keeping her off guard is the biggest key for us with Gray. She gets a lot of easy baskets from stealing inbounds passes. You have to be really aware of her in the passing lanes.”

She scored 32 points and shot 9-of-21 from the floor. Black said she will get her points, and it’s the other players that they need to stop, including Kristen Stainback.

Stainback scored 14 points on 5-of-11 shooting.

“I think the key for us is not to let the other players get off on us,” she said. “You have to limit (Stanback’s) touches, because we are capable of that. In this game you can’t really focus on one player. We have to make sure we don’t let anybody else get off.”

The main focus in practice this week, according to Black, was on the offensive side and defensive side of the ball, but mainly she focused on cutting the turnovers.

The Panthers are averaging 18 turnovers per game through 24 games this season. Also, in the last game against Southeast Missouri the Panthers had 16 turnovers.

“We have to cut our turnovers. It is plain and simple,” she said. “We have to get more shots and less turnovers. That I think is glaring in our stats.”

With the Panthers losing their last 4-of-5 games, staying positive might be a tough thing to do for Black’s team.

Black said her team knows they are as good as any of the teams in the OVC.

“We are not in the last four spots, we are in the 3-to-8 spot,” she said. “Right know we control our own destiny as opposed to hoping someone wins or loses. We have to keep getting better. Right now is where you need to peak.”

Austin Peay coach Carrie Daniels said the Panthers are a solid team and the biggest key is going to stop Eastern senior forward Sabina Oroszova.

“They have got players inside and out,” she said. “They are just a tremendous, talented team that can do a lot of things. With us, all year long, the things that we have stressed are defense and rebounding are going to be keys for us. Our defense has been one thing that has gotten us many times.”

The Panthers and Governors will tip-off at 7:30 p.m. on Thursday in the Winfield Dunn Center.

Bob Reynolds can be reached at 581-2812 or [email protected].