FIU Starts Women’s Basketball Season With Dud Against USF

The start of the 2025-26 season for FIU Women’s Basketball began with a dud, as the Panthers were defeated by the South Florida Bulls by a final score of 81-56.

The main story of this game was the inability to contain the offense for USF. They scored 20-plus points in each of their first three quarters. Even with some scoring surges here and there for the Panthers, it wasn’t enough to keep this game close.

When the Bulls weren’t scoring, they were dominating at the rim with rebounds and points. USF dropped 52 total rebounds and 36 points in the paint, while FIU managed both 36 boards and points, respectively.

It wasn’t all doom and gloom for FIU, thankfully. They were successful from long distance, knocking down six threes while USF managed just three made triples. The problem with that? These six threes were off of 20 attempts – 30% total.

NDATE for THREE + ONE 🙌 pic.twitter.com/bGJU2jAsHb

— FIU Women’s Basketball (@FIUWBB) November 4, 2025

As far as early playmakers for the Panthers, look no further than Denike Lightbourne. She led the way in scoring with 21 points in her first game as a Panther, along with eight rebounds – both were game-highs for FIU. Out of those six three-pointers, Ndate Ndiaye was responsible for half of them off of five attempts.

Overall, this was a tough loss for FIU, but at least it was against a reputable team. USF won the American Championship last season, with plenty of returners, and the Panthers still succeeded in some aspects.

The Panthers will look to get their first win later on this week. That opportunity will be at the Ocean Bank Convocation Center on Saturday, November 15th, against the Bethune-Cookman Wildcats. That’ll be at noon and can be seen on ESPN+.

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Jake Gibson

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