ABILENE – The Abilene Christian men's basketball team begins the home portion of its 2012-13 schedule this weekend with the Whitten Inn Classic. Doubleheaders featuring the Wildcats and opposition from McMurry, Sul Ross and York, begin Friday at 6 p.m. and Saturday at 4 p.m.
ACU's games vs. Sul Ross and York will be streamed via
SkyboxLive.com free of charge.
“We have two good teams in York and Sul Ross coming in to face us even though they play a level below us, so this is going to be a huge opportunity for their kids to see how they match up with our guys,” said second-year Wildcat head coach
Joe Golding. “But right now I mostly worried about us. We need to see improvement on the defensive end considering Dallas Baptist beat us 12 times on the glass and shot 50 percent from the field.”
The Patriots beat the Wildcats, 79-72, in a wild season-opener for both teams at The Burg Center last Friday. ACU jumped out to a quick 13-4 lead just 4:25 into the game, but the Patriots answered with a 19-5 run over the next six minutes to take a 23-19 lead with 8:18 to play.
The Wildcats whittled that lead to 23-22 on a 3-pointer by freshman guard
Parker Wentz at the seven-minute mark of the first half, but the Patriots closed the first half on a 21-7 run to take a 44-29 lead into the halftime break.
ACU rallied to trim its deficit all the way to two points at 72-70 with 1:34 to play on a layup by
Desmond Woodberry; however, Patriot Nick Fox answered with a three-point play to make it a 75-70 game with 1:14 to play. Wesley Gipson then hit a pair of free throws with 39 seconds left to push the lead to 77-70 and ice the game.
“We did some good things and some bad vs. the Patriots,” Golding said, “but I'm proud of the way we handled adversity on the road with all these new guys here. Now we just have to find ways to win those types of games.”
This weekend, the Wildcats will first battle York College of Nebraska, which returned four of its five leading scorers from last year's team and is off to an impressive 7-1 start. Thadd Varmall, who last year was an honorable mention all-America after averaging 15 points and 8.0 rebounds per game, leads the Panthers alongside Desmond Strickland, Marcus Johnson and Dylan Brewer.
Strickland averaged 13.0 points per game last year and was fifth in the nation in 3-point percentage at just under 47 percent. Johnson and Brewer, meanwhile, averaged 14 and 10 points per game.
Sul Ross will be making its season debut Friday at 6 p.m. vs. a McMurry team that is 1-0 following an 82-57 win over University of the Southwest Monday night. The Panthers finished 7-18 overall and 7-14 vs. the America South Conference last year and is expected to finish seventh in the West Division once again. Two of those losses came against the War Hawks, falling 68-63 at home and 85-75 at Kimbrell Arena.
As a new member to Division II and the Heartland Conference, McMurry first-year head coach Chris Beard brought in 10 new players during the offseason, including former Wildcat
Antonio Bell. In his lone season at ACU, Bell averaged 12.8 points per shots and shot 40 percent from the 3-point line through 22 starts.
Whitten Inn Classic Schedule
Friday, Nov. 16
McMurry vs. Sul Ross – 6 p.m.
Abilene Christian vs. York – 8 p.m.
Saturday, Nov. 17
McMurry vs. York – 4 p.m.
Abilene Christian vs. Sul Ross – 6 p.m.
