Kats Looking To Snap Skid At McNeese
1/4/2017 4:27:00 PM | Men's Basketball
Game 16
Thursday, Jan. 5 • Lake Charles, La. • 7:30 p.m. CT • Burton Coliseum (8,500)
Sam Houston State (9-6, 0-2 Southland) at McNeese (5-8, 2-0 Southland)
Live Stats • @BearkatsMBB on Twitter • Listen on KSAM
HUNTSVILLE, Texas – The Sam Houston State Bearkats will be looking to put a quick end to a tough skid to open conference play on Thursday when they take on McNeese at Burton Coliseum.
Sam Houston and McNeese have experienced two opposite starts to Southland play, just one week into the league slate. The Kats dropped each of their first two games of the Southland slate last week to Houston Baptist and at Central Arkansas and are one of four teams in the league without a conference win after the first weekend.
Meanwhile, McNeese followed up a 79-72 road win at Northwestern State on Saturday with a home 15-point win over Stephen F. Austin on Monday at Burton Coliseum, snapping the Lumberjacks' 26-game conference win streak in the process.
Fans can follow via live stats or by following @BearkatsMBB on Twitter, or listen live on KSAM 101.7 FM with Kooter Roberson on the call. Thursday's game will also be broadcast live for free on the Bearkat Sports Network.
THE LAST TIME OUT
Aaron Weidenaar hit three free throws with 1.5 seconds on the clock and Central Arkansas finished the game on a 7-1 run to pick up a 67-65 win over Sam Houston State on Saturday afternoon at the Farris Center.
Three Bearkats finished in double figures, led by 13 from Torry Butler, but Sam Houston was mired by an 0-for-15 start from the floor and 4-for-22 shooting from beyond the arc for the game.
UCA was led by Jordan Howard's 29 points, while both Derreck Brooks and Ethan Lee picked up 14 rebounds each in helping the Bears win the battle on the glass 49-45.
BEARKAT BYTES
- With a win the Bearkats would avoid their first 0-3 start to Southland Conference play since the 1996-97 season.
- The 119 points scored by the Bearkats against Randall was the most points scored by a Bearkats team since putting up 121 against Concordia Lutheran in the 2005-06 season. The Kats have now cracked the century mark 10 times under head coach Jason Hooten. Sam Houston did it twice last season and has had at least two 100-point outings each of the last four seasons.
- The Bearkats are making things happen on the defensive end, forcing 17.7 turnovers per game. That mark is tied with Lamar for tops in in the Southland, and ranks as 10th in the nation. Sam Houston had not lost a turnover battle this season until Dec. 22, and has won in turnover margin in 12 of 15 games.
- Sam Houston only had 11 blocked shots in its first seven games of the year, but has bulked up its rim protection with 25 rejections in its last eight contests.
- The Kats suffered four losses in non-conference with those teams - Ohio, Georgia Tech, Baylor and Arkansas - combining for an 43-9 record between them this year.
AMONG THE LONE STAR ELITE
With 23 Division I basketball teams within Texas' borders, one does not have to look far within the Lone Star State to find quality teams. In the last 3+ seasons under Jason Hooten, the Bearkats have been one of those teams and enter Saturday at McNeese having won 77 games since the beginning of the 2013-14 campaign. The only teams with more wins in that span include SMU (91), Stephen F. Austin (85) and Baylor (85).
KATS LEADING SLC IN FIELD GOAL PERCENTAGE DEFENSE
Opponents have not had an easy time getting quality shots against the Bearkat defense in 2016-17, shooting just 41.7 percent from the floor. That mark is the best in the Southland Conference and should the Kats finish tops in the league in that category, it would be the second time in the last three years it happened after they held teams to just 39.1 percent in 2014-15. In all, Sam Houston has led the SLC in field-goal percentage defense six times, all coming since 2000.
BRINGING BACK THE BULK
Hooten's squad boasted one of the most experienced rosters in the country entering the 2016-17 season, returning all five of its starters and each of its top seven scorers. In fact, the Kats returned 85.6 percent of its scoring from last year's 18-win team, an average of 64.2 points per game on the roster from a year ago.
SOUTHLAND FAVORITES
When the annual preseason polls came out from the Southland Conference, it was the Bearkats picked to claim the league crown by both the Southland SIDs and coaches. The Kats received six of 13 first-place votes in the coaches' poll and seven in the SID poll, coming just ahead of four-time defending league champion Stephen F. Austin.
GALBREATH GOES BACK-TO-BACK
Junior foroward Chris Galbreath Jr. claimed his second consecutive Southland Conference Player of the Week honor on Dec. 19 after averaging 14.0 points and 11.0 rebounds in wins over Sul Ross and North Texas. He is the first SLC player to win the honor multiple times, having also claimed it a week before after a 26-point effort in a win over Southern Illinois.
BALANCE BEAM
This season's version of the Bearkats features a deep and balanced roster with only one player - Dakarai Henderson (11.1 ppg) - averaging double figures in scoring, but has five averaging at least 8.7 ppg and nine with an average of at least 4.0 ppg. Hooten has kept a steady rotation of players in games with no player averaging more than Henderson's 26.5 minutes per game, which is only 34th among all players in the Southland Conference.
BENCH MARK
Through 15 games, the Bearkat bench has been a major part of this season's early success with Sam's reserves outscoring the opponent's bench in 12 of 15 contests, with the exceptions being against Baylor, North Texas and Arkansas. In all, Sam Houston's bench is outscoring its opponent's bench by a 34.5-23.8 margin.
MILLENIUMS
Senior Dakarai Henderson pumped in 14 points in the first half against Southern, reaching the 1,000-point milestone for his career. The senior is just the 23rd player in Bearkat history to reach the plateau and needs two points to pass Terry Mathis for 18th on the all-time scoring list. He is also second all-time at Sam Houston with 206 for his career and needs just four threes to pass Jeremy Burkhalter for that Bearkat record.
But Henderson is not the only Kat to reach the 1,000-point mark as teammate Aurimas Majauskas went for 18 points against Randall to reach the mark and now has give him 1,024 for his Bearkat tenure. Meanwhile, Paul Baxter is nearing the mark as well and enters Saturday's game vs UCA with 963 career points.
