Stephen F. Austin won 29 straight games and 32 overall last season in Brad Underwood’s first year as coach. It was the final game of that win streak that vaulted the school from Nacogdoches, Texas, into the college basketball spotlight.
Basketball
The dossier read like this: a 23-12 record, a conference tournament title and a trip to the NCAA Tournament. Also, the team’s top player was selected in the lottery of the NBA Draft. But in the world of college basketball, maintaining that kind of quality is a challenge, especially at the midmajor level.
Your father is arguably the greatest basketball player his college has produced. Yet you’re willing to follow in his footsteps, deal with all the pressure and unrealistic expectations? Of course you will. Especially if you’re Gary Payton’s son and you’re comfortable in your own skin.
Hall of Fame basketball coach Jerry Tarkanian was released from Valley Hospital Medical Center on Monday night after spending almost a week at the facility.
College basketball player Lauren Hill’s Indiana high school retired her jersey number this weekend in honor of her inspirational fight to continue playing despite having brain cancer.
To say Bruce Pearl missed coaching basketball is like saying Dick Vitale missed being away from the microphone to call college hoops on television after throat surgery.
There are different kinds of wins in sports. Ones when you outplay an opponent. Ones when you don’t and still succeed. Ones when you make your owns breaks. Ones when the other guys break down. UNLV’s basketball team had another kind Saturday. “This was a character win,” Rebels coach Dave Rice said.
Chris Wood scored 16 of his career-high 18 points in the second half to carry UNLV to a 57-50 victory over Temple in the Coaches vs. Cancer Classic third-place game at the Barclays Center. Wood, a 6-foot-11-inch sophomore forward, also tied his career high with 13 rebounds.
Chris Wood and Goodluck Okonoboh played well for the Rebels Saturday night against Temple, and Dave Rice righted the ship after a bad loss on Friday.
UNLV is a 3.5-point underdog against Temple in the consolation game of the Coaches vs. Cancer Classic at the Barclays Center today at 4 p.m.
The UNLV women’s basketball team shot only 31 percent from the field in a 79-60 loss to Missouri on Friday night in the Rainbow Wahine Classic at Honolulu.
After all the difficulty UNLV had with Stanford on Friday night, it’s probably fortunate the Rebels will not be playing a top-10 opponent like Duke on Saturday. Not that Temple is an easy draw.
Anthony Brown and Chasson Randle, a pair of senior guards, took UNLV’s highly touted freshmen to school and introduced them to big-time college basketball. It was a rude introduction.
Is there such a thing as a season-defining moment for a college basketball team in just its fourth game? For UNLV, it will find out Saturday.
This is going to be a team that begins and ends with the backcourt performance. Friday night’s debacle is a prime example.
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