Men's Basketball | 1/14/2017 12:54:00 AM
ABILENE — The ACU Wildcats are back home Saturday afternoon to take on one of the Southland Conference's hottest teams in the Lamar Cardinals in a game set for a 4 p.m. tipoff in Moody Coliseum.
The game can be heard on 98.1 FM The Ticket (98theticket.com) with Voice of the Wildcats
Grant Boone calling the play-by-play action.
The Wildcats are 7-9 overall and 1-4 in the Southland, but have lost six of their last seven entering Saturday's contest, including a 56-50 loss Thursday night at the hands of Southeastern Louisiana. The Lions completed their season sweep of the Wildcats just four days after ACU had knocked off four-time defending Southland Conference champion Stephen F. Austin, 69-60, in Moody Coliseum.
ACU led the Lions 22-10 at one point the first half, but Southeastern closed the ACU lead to just 26-25 at halftime, took the lead on its first possession of the second half and never trailed the rest of the game to deal the Wildcats a tough-to-swallow loss.
The Wildcats are led in scoring by sophomore forward
Jaren Lewis (14.3 points per game), followed by redshirt freshman post
Jalone Friday (12.8 ppg) and sophomore guard
Jaylen Franklin (10.6 ppg). Lewis leads the team in rebounding at 6.4 rpg, followed by Friday at 6.2 rpg.
ACU has been hampered all season by its struggles at the free throw line (just 65.2 percent on the season) and in the rebounding category where opponents are out-rebounding the Wildcats by an average of 36.5-31.2 rebounds per game. The Wildcats have been out-rebounded in eight straight games going into Saturday's game against Lamar.
The Cardinals are 11-6 overall and 3-1 in the league, but were expected to be a Southland also-ran after being picked to finish 12th in the 13-team league in the pre-season polls.
Lamar is led by junior transfer Colton Weisbrod, who was a first team junior college all-America last year. He's averaging a team-best 16.2 points per game, followed by sophomore guard Nick Garth, who is averaging 11.9 ppg. The Cardinals lead the Southland in scoring offense at 79.9 ppg, while ACU is third in the league in scoring defense, allowing just 69.9 ppg.
