ABILENE – The Wildcats will open the new year with a trip to Beaumont, Texas to face Lamar as they continue conference play. ACU opened their conference schedule with two impressive wins, at New Orleans and a dominant home win over Nicholls, and look to continue that success this weekend. The team is coming off a tough loss to the No. 25 Shockers of Wichita State, but the team showed a great deal of resilience against one of the nation's top teams. The Wildcats hope to start conference play at 3-0 before they head home for three-straight home contests.
FOLLOW THE GAME
- ACU at Lamar: Saturday, Jan. 4 – 2:00 p.m. – 98.1 The Ticket with
Grant Boone (Radio Broadcast)
SERIES HISTORY
- The series dates back to 1962 with ACU holding the 16-14 advantage over the Cardinals.
- Since joining the Southland Conference, the teams have met eight times with the Wildcats going 5-3 in those contests.
- The Wildcats are on a five-game winning streak against the Cardinals, all but one of those wins by single digits.
- The last meeting between the teams was in Beaumont last year with ACU coming out on top with an 11-point victory. In that game
Payten Ricks scored eight for ACU while
Joe Pleasant came off the bench for nine points and three rebounds.
ACU STORYLINES
- The Wildcats loss at Wichita State was their only loss of December, the team finished 5-1 for the month.
- Senior guard,
Payten Ricks, has struggled from deep in the last two games going a combined 0-13 from three-point range.
- In their two conference games so far, the Wildcats have forced 44 turnovers and totaled 48 points off turnovers.
- Ricks continues to lead ACU in scoring at 14.0 ppg, but both
Joe Pleasant and
Kolton Kohl are averaging over 10 ppg.
-
Coryon Mason had a breakout game against Wichita State scoring 16 points and hitting three shots from deep, matching his season total of made threes.
SCOUTING LAMAR
- The Cardinals come into the contest at 2-1 in SLC play, they have wins over SLU and UNO while they dropped their contest against Northwestern State.
- Lamar is led in scoring by senior, T.J. Atwood, who is averaging 15.9 ppg and has scored in double figures in all but two contests.
- Holding opponents to just 65.2 points per contest the Cardinals rank 91
st in the nation for scoring defense.
- Junior forward, Avery Sullivan, is averaging a double-double for Lamar and he has notched seven double-doubles on the season so far.
