Elena Tsineke was named First Team All-AAC, Bethy Mununga and Dulcy Fankam Mendjiadeu earn Second Team honors.
IRVING, Texas (March 6, 2022) – University of South Florida women’s basketball standout guard Elena Tsineke and forwards Bethy Mununga and Dulcy Fankam Mendjiadeu were rewarded for their impressive seasons by the American Athletic Conference when the league’s postseason awards were announced on Sunday.
Click here for the American Athletic Conference Tournament Central page.
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Tsineke earned First Team All-Conference honors for the second-straight season after starting her career with the Bulls as The American Rookie of the Year and a Third-Team selection in 2019-20. The sophomore guard leads South Florida in scoring, averaging 13.9 points per game. She has poured in double figures in 23 of the 28 games she has played, including 18 of the last 20 outings, and fell one point shy of tying her career-high when she netted 30 points in the Bulls’ win against Tulsa on Jan. 19. She also became the 26th player in program history to reach the 1,000-point plateau when she did it against Houston on March 2.
Tsineke is shooting just under 40 percent from the field and is hitting 82.3 percent of her shots from the charity stripe. She has shot 50 percent or better from the field 10 times, including at a 63.6 percent (7-for-11) against Houston, en route to a game-high 18 points.
In addition, Tsineke was named to the All-Tournament Team at the inaugural women’s Battle 4 Atlantis, averaging 12.6 points and 6.0 rebounds, plus 2.7 assists and 1.7 steals per game. She started off the tournament with back-to-back 17-point games against Syracuse and UConn and helped to lead the Bulls to a 2-1 record and a third-place finish with wins against Syracuse (77-53) on Nov. 20 and No. 9/9 Oregon (71-62) on Nov. 22 in the tournament finale. South Florida’s only loss was a 60-53 setback to No. 2/2 UConn on Nov. 21.
Tsineke is also just sixth USF women’s player in the history of the program to earn multiple first-team all-conference honors, along with Courtney Williams (3 AAC), Jessica Dickson (2 Big East, 1 C-USA), Kitija Laksa (2 AAC), Maria Jespersen (2 AAC) and Angie Snyder (1 Metro, 1 Sun Belt).
Mununga, a senior forward, continues to prove that she is one of the most dominating rebounders in women’s college basketball. She earned second team honors after averaging a double-double with 11.0 points and 11.3 rebounds per game. Her rebounding average is first in the AAC and 16th in the nation, while her 328 rebounds are tops in The American and ninth nationally.
Mununga has been a double-double machine, recording 12 of her 32-career double-doubles this season. The 12 this year rank first in the American and 31st in Division I. Of the 12 double-double performances, two of them were 20-rebound games – in back-to-back outings – against Stanford when she hauled down a career-high 23 and 20 at UT Arlington.
In addition, Mununga enters the American Athletic Conference Tournament fourth on the school’s all-time rebounding list with 917 for her career and needing just 15 from moving into sole possession of third all-time.
Fankam Mendjiadeu has been a force inside for South Florida all season. The senior earned her second-team honors after averaging 11.2 points and 7.6 rebounds per outing. Like Mununga, Fankam Mendjiadeu has recorded seven double-doubles on the year and 32 for her career.
A transfer from Memphis, Fankam Mendjiadeu has logged 17 double-figure scoring games, including a career-high-tying 23 points at Tulane on Jan. 12 and 22 points at Virginia Commonwealth on Dec. 12.
During her three seasons at Memphis and USF, Fankam Mendjiadeu boasts 688 rebounds for her career, 220 this season.
The 2021 Air Force Reserve American Athletic Conference Tournament will take place March 7-10 at Dickies Arena in Fort Worth, Texas.
This season’s honorees will lead the Bulls (22-7, 12-3 AAC) into their AAC Tournament quarterfinal matchup on Tuesday at 7 p.m. ET (ESPN+) against the winner of the first-round game between seventh-seeded Memphis and 10th-seeded East Carolina. The winner of the quarterfinal game will advance to the semifinals on Wednesday at 7 p.m. (ESPN+). The American championship game is slated for Thursday at 9 p.m. ET on ESPNU.
The Bulls are 12-7 all-time in the AAC Tournament and have advanced to at least the semifinal round in each of the previous seven tournaments and to the championship game four times (2015, 2016, 2017, 2018).
Below is the complete 2022 Air Force Reserve American Athletic Conference tournament schedule.
First Round – Monday, March 7
Game 1 (ESPN+) No. 9 Wichita State vs. No. 8 Tulsa – 2 p.m. ET
Game 2 (ESPN+) No. 10 East Carolina vs. No. 7 Memphis – 4 p.m. ET
Game 3 (ESPN+) No. 11 Cincinnati vs. No. 6 Houston – 6 p.m. ET
Quarterfinals – Tuesday, March 8
Game 4 (ESPN+) 8/9 winner vs. No. 1 UCF – 1 p.m. ET
Game 5 (ESPN+) No. 5 SMU vs. No. 4 Temple – 3 p.m. ET
Game 6 (ESPN+) 7/10 winner vs. No. 2 South Florida – 7 p.m. ET
Game 7 (ESPN+) 6/11 winner vs. No. 3 Tulane – 9 p.m. ET
Semifinals – Wednesday, March 9
Game 8 (ESPN+) Game 4 winner vs. Game 5 winner – 5 p.m. ET
Game 9 (ESPN+) Game 6 winner vs. Game 7 winner – 7 p.m. ET
Final – Thursday, March 10
Game 10 (ESPNU) Semifinal winners – 9 p.m. ET
About USF Women’s Basketball
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USF recorded its best season in program history during the 2020-21 campaign, all while navigating the unpredictable COVID-19 landscape. In doing so, the Bulls won their first-ever American Athletic Conference regular-season and tournament titles, and posted their highest ranking in the Associated Press Top25 poll – reaching as high as No. 12 – and made their ninth straight postseason appearance, and sixth NCAA appearance in the last 10 years.
USF has made 16 postseason tournament appearances and had seven NCAA Tournament berths in head coach Jose Fernandez’s 21 seasons. The all-time winningest coach in program history, Fernandez has guided USF to nine 20-win seasons, two WNIT final four appearances, the 2009 WNIT championship, and won nearly 400 career games. For his efforts on the sideline during the 2020-21 season, Fernandez was named a finalist for the WBCA and semifinalist for the Naismith National Coach of the Year Awards. He was also tabbed the 2021 American Athletic Conference Coach of the Year.
The Bulls posted a 19-4 record and had five players, during the 2020-21 campaign, the Bulls had five players recognized by The American for impressive seasons, including Elisa Pinzan (Most Improved Player, All-Conference Second Team), Maria Alvarez (Co-Sixth Player of the Year), Bethy Mununga (All-Conference First Team), Elena Tsineke (All-Conference First Team), and Sydni Harvey (All-Conference Third Team).
In addition, Harvey was named the American Athletic Conference Tournament Most Outstanding Player and to the All-Tournament Team, while Mununga and Tsineke were also All-Tournament selections.
– #GoBulls
