University of Southern Mississippi Athletics
Men's Basketball Begins Weekend Homestand Thursday with UTSA
1/4/2017 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
HATTIESBURG, Miss. -- The Southern Miss men's basketball team will be inside Reed Green Coliseum twice this weekend as it gets fully entrenched in Conference USA play, first taking on UTSA at 7 p.m. on Thursday.
Fans can tune in to the game via John Cox and the Southern Miss IMG Sports Network (104.5 in Hattiesburg/Laurel), the live video stream on Southern Miss All Access, or by following @SouthernMissMBB on Twitter.
Promotions for the game include Season Ticket Holder Appreciation Night (each account holder can claim two complimentary tickets) and the welcoming of the Hub City Special Olympics, featuring a halftime exhibition and spirit line to welcome the team onto the floor pregame.
â€" Southern Miss is in the midst of a three-home game stretch to begin its C-USA campaign. Its last two games came on both Christmas and New Year's Day. The Golden Eagles and Roadrunners have only met five times, all in the last three years, and the home team has won each time.
â€" The Black and Gold's last two home games have seen outstanding second-half shooting displays. Quinton Campbell and Cortez Edwards had career-highs of seven field goals and seven assists, respectively, as the Golden Eagles ultimately went 16-for-28 (57 percent) in the second half, making 12 of their 15 shots that were inside the arc. The Dec. 10 game against Tulane saw Michael Ramey connect from deep on the team's final two shots before the half, en route to ending the game 19-of-34 from the field (56 percent).
â€" The most-recent Hattiesburg matchup between the two squads saw five Golden Eagles score in double-figures, helped by Khari Price's 12 points and 11 assists, in an 86-70 win. Raheem Watts had a career-high 19 points and Quinton Campbell added 13 more. Southern Miss went 28-for-33 from the foul line and took a 17-point lead with 8:58 in the second half, scoring 51 points in that stanza.
â€" Kevin Holland is 16-for-35 from behind the arc this year (46 percent) and was over 61 percent going into the Dec. 19 Miss. State game. This comes after he redshirted last season and was 8-for-42 (19 percent) as a freshman in 2014-15. Bilal Abdur-Rahim has quietly become the team's top shooter on the stat sheet at 54 percent (19-for-35) in his nine games. He's 12-for-20 in the last three outings.
â€" Cortez Edwards has taken on his new starting guard role and (literally) run with it. The sophomore led the Golden Eagles in virtually every category at the Hawaiian Airlines Diamond Head Classic and played another 38 minutes in the LA Tech game. He has been on the floor for all but 14 minutes those last four outings, including three battles in four days on the islands (with a 9:30 a.m. Christmas game).
â€" With Edwards moving into the starting lineup, Michael Ramey has remained confident despite coming off the bench each of those three Hawaii games for the first times this year. In that stretch, he recorded his third and fourth double-digit scoring games of the year and led Southern Miss in scoring against Hawaii (11 points), just the second time he's accomplished that feat in his career. His 27 minutes played against the Bulldogs on Sunday were also his second-most on the year behind his 30 on Nov. 15 at LSU.
â€" UTSA head coach Steve Henson will take his team into Hattiesburg with a three-game winning streak, most recently defeating UTEP 67-55 at home to open the league season. Henson has had immense success as an assistant coach for both UNLV and Oklahoma among other stops, and played throughout the entire 1990s on NBA, CBA and international teams.
â€" Byron Frohnen has been deadly as a true freshman, shooting a team-high 53 percent while starting every game. Jeff Beverly is also leading the way with 14.4 points per game, and like Southern Miss, the Roadrunners have a bevy of potential leading-rebounders for any game. Beverly and Frohnen pace UTSA with 6.6 and 6.1 per contest, respectively.
