Aug. 29, 2014
LEXINGTON, Ky. – The Southeastern Conference announced its 14-team, 16-game women’s basketball schedule for the 2014-15 season on Thursday and Kentucky’s slate is highlighted by eight home matchups, including battles in Memorial Coliseum with Florida, Tennessee, Texas A&M and South Carolina as well as road matchups at LSU, Vanderbilt and Tennessee.
This marks the sixth year of the 16-game schedule for women’s basketball and the third with 14 teams. The schedule is a single round-robin with one permanent home-and-home opponent and two random home-and-home opponents. Kentucky’s permanent partner is South Carolina, and for this season, UK will face Ole Miss and Tennessee in home-and-home matchups.
ESPN2 and ESPNU will broadcast a combined 16 conference contests, including four Kentucky games. The SEC Network will televise 44 total games, eight featuring the Wildcats. The SEC’s games on ESPN platforms are exclusively branded as the “SEC on ESPN.” There will be a package of televised non-conference games which will be announced at a later date. Additionally, Kentucky will have the ability to produce conference and non-conference games not televised for SEC Network +, exclusive games available on WatchESPN and SECSports.com.
Kentucky opens league play on the road on Jan. 2 at Alabama for the second straight season before playing host to Ole Miss on the SEC Network and Auburn on Jan. 4 and Jan. 8, respectively. The Wildcats will travel to Columbia, S.C., for a matchup with the Gamecocks on Jan. 11 which will be televised on ESPN2 and then welcome the Florida Gators to Memorial Coliseum on Jan. 15. That game also will be carried live on the SEC Network.
Back-to-back road games at LSU on ESPNU (Jan. 18) and Missouri (Jan. 25) on the SEC Network await the Wildcats before they play host to border rival Tennessee on the SEC Network on Thursday, Jan. 29. UK will be looking for its third straight win over the Lady Vols in the storied Coliseum.
Georgia visits Memorial Coliseum on Feb. 1 and the Wildcats look to chart their first win over the Lady Bulldogs in Lexington since 2010. That game also will be televised on the SEC Network, as well as the following two games at Vanderbilt on Feb. 8 and vs. Mississippi State on Feb. 12 in Memorial.
Three of UK’s final five conference games are on the road. UK will travel to Knoxville, Tenn., on Feb. 15 to face the Lady Vols in the second matchup of the season. The game will be carried on ESPN2. The Wildcats won last year’s meeting in Knoxville, 75-71. It marked UK’s first-ever win in Thompson-Boling Arena and the first win in Knoxville since 1985.
The Cats will return home to face Texas A&M on Feb. 19 and then hit the road for games at Ole Miss (Feb. 23) and Arkansas (Feb. 26). Senior Day and the regular-season home finale will be played on Sunday, March 1 vs. South Carolina. The game is considered a “net flex game” as it will be either be televised on ESPNU at 2 p.m. ET or ESPN2 at 5 p.m. ET. The network and time of the contest will be determined 7-10 days out. Four seniors – Azia Bishop (Toledo, Ohio), Bria Goss (Indianapolis), Jennifer O’Neill (Bronx, N.Y.), and Jelléah Sidney (Queens Village, N.Y.) – will be honored during a special “Senior Day” ceremony before the game.
This year’s SEC Tournament will be held at The Verizon Center in North Little Rock, Ark. The tournament will include all 14 teams and begins Wednesday, March 4 and concludes with the championship game on Sunday, March 8.
All of the games airing on the ESPN family of networks (ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU) and the SEC Network will be available through WatchESPN, accessible online at WatchESPN.com, on smartphones and tablets via the WatchESPN app, and streamed on televisions through Amazon Fire TV, Apple TV, Chromecast, Roku, Xbox 360 or Xbox One to fans who receive their video subscription from an affiliated provider. Fox Sports Net events will be available via these avenues outside the SEC Footprint only.
AT&T U-verse® TV, Bright House Networks, Charter, Comcast Xfinity TV, Cox Communications, DIRECTV, DISH, Google Fiber, LUS Fiber, PTC Communications, Suddenlink, Time Warner Cable, NCTC, NRTC, NTTC, Verizon FiOS and Wilkes Telephone will carry the SEC Network nationwide. Hundreds of additional live events from various sports will be offered exclusively as SEC Network+ events on WatchESPN and SECNetwork.com through AT&T U-verse, Charter, Comcast, Cox, DISH, Google Fiber, Suddenlink, NCTC, NRTC, NTTC and Verizon FiOS authentication.
All UK Hoops games can also be heard live on the UK Radio Network and UKathletics.com with Neil Price calling the action.
The Wildcats, who were ranked No. 6 in an early preseason poll by ESPN.com columnist Charlie Crème, returns seven letter winners, including key players in Goss and O’Neill, returning starting point guard junior Janee Thompson (Chicago) and sophomore guards Linnae Harper (Chicago) and Makayla Epps (Lebanon, Ky.). New additions to the roster this season include junior-college transfer and 6-foot-6 center Ivana Jakubcova (Bratislava, Slovakia), freshman shooting guard Jaycee Coe (Gainesboro, Tenn.), freshman forward/center Alexis Jennings (Madison, Ala.) and freshman center Alyssa Rice (Reynoldsburg, Ohio). Sophomore forward Kyvin Goodin-Rogers (Lebanon, Ky.) also will be available for action after sitting out last season with a pulmonary embolism.
Season tickets are available for purchase for $65 online at UKathletics.com/tickets or by calling the UK Ticket Office at 859-257-1818 or 1-800-928-2287. Lower level reserved tickets for UK’s game vs. Baylor in Rupp Arena on Nov. 17 are also available for only $9 by calling the UK Ticket Office. Seats will be assigned in September after the season ticket renewal deadline. All other single-game tickets will go on sale in late October.
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