Saturday’s game between the Eastern women’s basketball team and Southern Illinois-Edwardsville will feature two teams that are both struggling to find a way to win a game.

Edwardsville comes into the game losing seven out of its last eight games, which were all Ohio Valley Conference games.

The Cougars have only one win in January, and hold a 5-16 record overall and 2-7 in the conference.

Edwardsville is 0-4 on the road this season in the OVC.

The Cougars leading scorer Tierny Austin struggled shooting the ball in the loss to Southeast Missouri.

She averages 13.3 points a game and only shot 22.2 percent in the loss, which was good enough for 12 points.

The Cougars rank last in the conference at a minus 10.1 scoring margin, scoring 64.6 points per game and allowing 74.7

They are also in the bottom three in terms of scoring offense, and also scoring defense.

The Panthers come into this game losing four of their last five conference games.

Eastern, its last time out, lost to Tennessee-Martin, which saw the Panthers let up 103 points.

There were a couple positives that came from the loss on Monday. The Panthers shot a season-high 70 percent from the floor in the second half on 17-of-24 shooting.

Also, they got scoring from two of their ‘big three.’ Sabina Oroszova and Katlyn Payne both scored more than 20 points.

Payne scored 26 points on 9-of-18 shooting and also 7-of-16 from 3-point range.

Payne is one three pointer make away from breaking the all-time 3-point shots made in a season and is currently tied for first in Eastern history with most three pointers made in a season at 58.

Oroszova hit the 20-point mark for the eighth time this season on 8-of-14 shooting. The Panthers are 6-2 in games that Oroszova scores 20 or more points.

The only other loss, including Monday, was in the University of Missouri-Kansas City tournament, where the Panthers lost to UMKC. Oroszova scored 26 points.

Arnisha Thomas scored a career-high 16 points in Monday’s loss to Tennessee-Martin. The junior college transfer has been solid off the bench this season.

Jordyne Crunk provided a career-high in assists for her with 10.

The Panthers come into this game with the second best free-throw percentage in the conference at 74 percent. They also rank third amongst teams in the OVC in field goal percentage at 41.4 percent.

This is will be the 22nd meeting between the two schools. Eastern holds an 18-3 record, but the Cougars have defeated the Panthers twice in the last two seasons in Lantz Arena.

Tipoff is set for 4:15 p.m. Saturday at Lantz Arena.

Bob Reynolds can be reached at 581-2812 or rjreynolds@eiu.edu