As if things couldn’t get any worse for the women’s basketball team, the Huskies now have to finish the season without their leading scorer, senior forward Satavia Taylor.

Head coach Kathi Bennett confirmed Tuesday that Taylor tore her ACL in the second half of Sunday’s loss against Miami of Ohio.

“We are going to have to change a little bit cause we lost Satavia,” Bennett said. “She tore her ACL, so I think the adjustment we have to make is that we’ve got to get some scoring inside.”

Taylor is one of two seniors on the team and has led the Huskies in scoring in six of their last nine games. Five of those games were against MAC opponents, including one against Ball State in January where Taylor scored a career-high 24 points.

“I feel terrible for her cause she was having an all-MAC year,” Bennett said. “I think sometimes when something like that happens you really realize that tomorrow is never promised so we’ve really got to band together and work hard.”

Taylor’s 12.4 points per game will be hard to replace in an already struggling offense. The Huskies (5-16, 0-8 MAC) face the Ohio Bobcats (5-15, 0-8 MAC). Led by freshman guard Kiyanna Black and her 12 points per game, the Bobcats have only managed 53.8 points per game while giving up 66.2 to their opponents.

Bennett knows that with Taylor down, the team is going to have to find alternate ways to manufacture points starting in the paint.

“We have to have people step up, and that’s one area where we can really step up and help from a scoring standpoint,” Bennett said. “I know we’re gonna work really hard and find a way to win and have Tay in the back of our minds and try to play our hearts out for her.”

Sophomore forward Jada Buggs has had a nagging knee injury for most of the year but after a 12-point performance against the Miami Redhawks, Bennett looks to get Buggs more involved against the Bobcats. Sophomore forward Jenna Thorp is also coming off a good offensive performance with a season-high 16-point game Sunday. Thorp added eight rebounds and looks to contribute more offensively against a struggling Ohio team.

“I need to be aggressive and attack the hoop but also look to make that extra pass and find the open player,” Thorp said. “I will have a little more of a scorer’s mentality than I have in the past so I will try to step up for my team that way in order to put more points on the board.”

Thorp echoed Bennett in the wake of Taylor’s injury. “We are all pretty upset and feel terrible for her. She was having an awesome season,” Thorp said. “We are gonna get it in our minds to work every day that much harder for her.”

The Huskies are still looking for their first MAC win and are trying to break a nine straight losing run, eight of those being MAC games.