CONWAY, Ark. – Two up-and-coming Southland Conference men's basketball programs will get together for the second time this season Thursday night at the Farris Center when the ACU Wildcats take on the Central Arkansas Bears.
Tipoff is set for 7 p.m. Thursday and the game can be heard on 98.1 FM (98theticket.com) with Voice of the Wildcats calling the play-by-play action. The game can be seen on the
UCA website.
The Wildcats are 10-12 overall and 4-7 in the Southland after back-to-back home wins last week over the two teams that entered the week in first place: New Orleans last Thursday and Sam Houston State last Saturday.
The Bears are 6-18 overall and 5-6 in the league and will be trying to win their third straight game Thursday night when they host ACU. Central Arkansas beat Northwestern State 107-97 and Southeastern Louisiana 68-66 last week to move into a seventh-place tie in the Southland Conference standings.
Sophomore guard
Jaylen Franklin averaged 15.5 points and 6.0 assists per game last week in the two wins, his best two-game stretch of the season, earning honorable mention Southland Conference Player of the Week honors.
The Wildcats enter Thursday night's game at Central Arkansas as the third-ranked scoring defensive team in the league, allowing just 69.6 ppg, while UCA is last in the league in scoring defense, allowing 83.5 ppg. ACU is third in the league in field goal percentage defense, allowing opponents to hit just 44.3 percent of their shots from the field. The Wildcats are also second in the league in the 3-point field goal percentage defense, allowing opponents to hit just 33.0 percent of their shots from beyond the arc.
While ACU is 12th in the league in scoring offense (68.3 ppg), the Wildcats are third in the league in field goal percentage (46.7 percent) and third in the league in the league in 3-point field goal percentage (37.3 percent).
ACU is 2-0 with both wins coming last week with the starting lineup of sophomore guard
Jaylen Franklin, junior guard
Isaiah Tripp, sophomore wing
Jaren Lewis, sophomore forward
Hayden Howell and redshirt freshman post
Jalone Friday. That lineup is the eighth different starting lineup that the Wildcats have used this season.
Thursday night's game features four of the top 13 scorers and five of the top 30 in the league, led by UCA junior guard Jordan Howard, who is third in the league in scoring, averaging 19.7 ppg. UCA forward Mathieu Kamba is 11th in the league in scoring at 14.8 ppg, and both players scored 28 points last month in the Bears' win in Abilene. Lewis is 12th in the league in scoring, averaging 14.2 ppg for the Wildcats, while Friday is 13th in the league in scoring at 13.6 ppg. Franklin is tied for 30th in the league in scoring at 10.7 ppg after scoring 19 points in the win over Sam Houston State, his second-best scoring effort of the season behind a 20-point effort at Sacramento State last December.
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