Taylor named Player of the Year, Adams earns All-Conference nod

FLORENCE, SC – Francis Marion University senior post player Lauryn Taylor has been selected as the Conference Carolinas Women’s Basketball Player of the Year and Defensive Player of the Year for 2023-24, while teammate Trinity Adams earned All-Conference recognition as the league announced its post-season honors on Thursday (March 7).

Taylor is a first-team All-Conference selection for the second consecutive year and also repeats as the Player of the Year.  She was a second-team pick as a sophomore 2022.  Adams was a second-team selection for this season.

Taylor, a 5-foot-11 native of Blythewood, S.C., is second in the conference in scoring at 17.9 points per game and leads the nation in rebounding at 15.0 rebounds per contest.   She has connected on 45.9 percent of her field goal attempts, including shooting 34.2 percent from three-point range, and has drained 66.9 percent of her free throw attempts.  She also registered 53 assists, 27 steals, and 13 blocked shots.  She is second in NCAA Division II with 21 double-doubles, and has posted 12 games of 20 or more points.

Taylor is ninth on the school’s career scoring list with 1,632 points and sixth in career rebounds with 1,008, while totaling 48 career double-doubles.  Seven times this season, she was named the conference’s Player of the Week and twice was tabbed as the Defensive Player of the Week.  She was also selected as the D2CIDA National Player of the Week on two occasions.  She was recently named to the Academic All-Conference Team as well.

On Feb. 15 against North Greenville University, she set the NCAA (all divisions) single-game rebounding record with 43.

In the conference, Taylor ranks eighth in field goal percentage, 14th in minutes played (31.9), 15th in free throw percentage, and 22nd in blocks per game (0.5).

Adams, a 5-9 sophomore from Rock Hill, S.C., averaged 12.9 points and 5.3 rebounds per game, while registering 40 assists, 31 steals, and six blocked shots.  She shot 74.3 percent from the free throw stripe and hit 35.6 percent of her shots from behind the three-point arc.  She scored in double figures 17 times, including five games of 20 or more points.

She third in the conference in field goal accuracy at 51.7 percent, while also ranking 11th in scoring and 25th in rebounding.  She was tabbed as the conference Defensive Player of the Week once during the regular season.

The pair have helped Francis Marion to a 20-7 record – the program’s second straight 20-win campaign – and the No.2 seed in the conference tournament.  The Patriots will play in the semifinals on Saturday at 7:30 p.m. in Wofford College’s Jerry Richardson Indoor Stadium in Spartanburg.

Taylor is a graduate of Spring Valley High School and is majoring in psychology. Adams, a product of South Pointe High School, is a business major.