Stephen F. Austin
Lamar
SFA Travels to Beaumont for Saturday Showdown at Lamar
3/1/2019 4:48:00 PM | Men's Basketball
'Jacks will try to snap three-game skid against Cardinals
Game Twenty-Eight
SFA (14-13, 7-8 Southland) at Lamar (17-12, 10-6 Southland)
Saturday, March 2 | 4:30 p.m. | Montagne Center (10,080) | Beaumont, Texas
Tickets | Watch (ESPN+/ESPN app) | Listen (Q107.7/TuneIn) | Live Stats | SFA Game Notes | Lamar Game Notes
THE OPENING TIP
• Down to only three games remaining on its regular season schedule, the SFA men's basketball team sets out on a journey to Beaumont, Texas, to tangle with Southland Conference adversary Lamar inside the Montagne Center at 4:30 p.m. Saturday afternoon.
• ESPN+ and the ESPN app will carry each and every second of the 66th meeting between the 'Jacks and Cardinals while longtime Lumberjack play-by-play man Rob Meyers will deliver play-by-play and analysis on the Learfield/IMG College Lumberjack Sports Network available on Q107.7 FM in Nacogdoches and globally on the TuneIn app.
• Currently the 'Jacks sit in sixth place in the Southland Conference standings, but a win would do wonders to create some separate between SFA and a gang of six teams that are tied for seventh just one game back of the 'Jacks. Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, Central Arkansas, Houston Baptist and Northwestern State are all knotted up at 6-9 in league action and sit just behind SFA.
• SFA heads into the Montagne Center trying to put an end to a three-game losing skid to the Cardinals. No current Southland Conference team has defeated the 'Jacks four or more times in a row since Northwestern State won five in a row against SFA from January 6, 2005 until February 16, 2008.
• Kevon Harris leads SFA in scoring at a clip of 18.3 points per game. That average also leads the Southland and in league-only games the Ellenwood, Ga., product is pumping in points at a rate of 21.5 to lead all conference players. With just seven more points, he will have 500 on the season and become just the 10th player in SFA's NCAA-era history to score 500 or more points in a single season.
• Shannon Bogues isn't far behind Harris as the senior out of Killeen, Texas, ranks second in the Southland in scoring with his average of 17.7 points per game. Wednesday night at Central Arkansas, Bogues became the 32nd player in program to reach the 1,000-point plateau by pumping in a game-high 23 points. It was Bogues' eighth 20+ point effort of 2018-19.
SCOUTING LAMAR | ROSTER | SCHEDULE | STATISTICS
• Already assured a spot in the 2019 Southland Conference Tournament, the Cardinals are riding a six-game winning streak and will play their final two regular season games of the 2018-19 campaign inside the Montagne Center beginning with their showdown with SFA Saturday afternoon.
• The Cardinals' six-game winning streak - the team's longest since the 2011-12 campaign - started with an 82-67 triumph over the 'Jacks in Nacogdoches and during their current winning streak the Cardinals' average margin of victory is 13.5 points.
• A strong defensive team, Lamar ranks among the top 10 nationally in total steals (sixth, 263) and steals per game (ninth, 9.1). The Cardinals lead the Southland in those two categories and are forcing an average of 16.86 turnovers per game - the 12th-most by any NCAA Division I men's basketball team this season.
• Lamar gets to the foul line with more regularity than any other squad in the Southland Conference. The Cardinals lead the 13-team league with 746 free throw tries and are also tops in the league with 514 free throws made. Nationally the Cardinals rank fourth in free throw tries and sixth in free throw makes and Leading that charge from the line is Nzeakor who ranks third in the Southland with 161 attempts from the foul stripe.
• Four players are averaging double-digits for the Cardinals and that scoring quartet is let by Nick Garth and his 16.5 points per game. Next up is Nzeakor and his 14.5 points per game while Jordan Hunter (11.5 ppg) and T.J. Atwood (10.9 ppg) rank third and fourth on the team respectively.
COMING UP NEXT
• In its first - and only - Tuesday night matchup in the 2019 portion of their regular season schedule, the SFA men's basketball team embarks on a lengthy journey to the west to take on Abilene Christian at 7:00 p.m. inside Moody Coliseum Tuesday night. The 'Jacks' showdown with the Wildcats represents the team's final true road game of the 2018-19 season.
-SFA-
