TYLER, TEXAS – The University of Texas at Tyler men's basketball team will return to their home court for the first time in 34 days on Friday and Saturday night against UAFS.
The Patriots picked up a pair of key wins on the road last weekend against Cameron to push their overall record to 4-9 on the season. UT Tyler will look to secure their first win on their home court since a 106-67 victory on Dec. 18 against Dallas Christian in a 2020-21 season which has been shortened due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
UT Tyler outscored Cameron by a 17-7 margin in overtime of Monday's win to complete the two-game sweep of the Aggies. UAFS on the other hand has dropped three straight contests entering this weekend's set of games after having a week of games postponed due to COVID-19 protocols.
FINDING A WAY TO GET IT DONE
Last week's victories for Cameron proved to be extremely different styles of wins for the Patriots, as they led for all but two minutes of the contest in Sunday's 76-66 win. UT Tyler held Cameron without a made field in the final minutes of the contest and used 16 points from
Soloman Thomas to post win number three on the year.
The Patriots also committed a season-low 10 turnovers throughout the game and recorded 20 points off of turnovers.
It took much longer for the Patriots to build a lead in Monday afternoon's overtime win against Cameron, as a 12-0 run by UT Tyler put the tally at 53-41 in favor of the Patriots with 12:35 remaining. A contested three-point make at the buzzer made the Aggies' comeback over the final ten minutes of play count and forced overtime. That overtime period proved to be all UT Tyler needed however as a 15-2 run by the Patriots matched the largest lead of the game with just 53 seconds remaining in overtime.
Da'Zhon Wyche scored a season high 26 points, eight of which came in the overtime period, to lead the Patriots in scoring in the 85-75 victory.
A BALANCED OVERALL EFFORT
The Patriots enter the weekend's games against UAFS ranked eighth in the Lone Star Conference in both scoring offense (76.2 ppg) and scoring defense (77.8 ppg). Four different Patriots are now averaging double-digit scoring figures in
Micah Fuller (14.5 ppg), Wyche (12.9 ppg), Thomas (11.8 ppg) and
Emanuel Gant (10.7 ppg).
The ability to retain that balanced effort will be key as the Patriots have just eight contests remaining on the schedule for 2020-21. Five of those will take place inside the Herrington Patriot Center allowing for plenty of opportunity for the Patriots to match last season's win total of eight in the program's final season of the Division II transition period.
SCOUTING THE LIONS
UAFS enters the weekend with a record of 3-7 after dropping last weekend's match-ups to Lubbock Christian by 76-72 and 59-49 final scores. Veteran coach Jim Boone will lead the Lions in his 35
th season as a head coach at the Division I or II levels and is eighth among active coaches in career wins.
Freshman Payton Brown is one of the league's top young guards and enters the weekend with a scoring average of 17.5 points per game in his eight games played this season. Chris Rollins recently had a streak of nine consecutive games with double-digit scoring figures snapped in his most recent outing against Lubbock Christian and averages 15.7 points a contest. Three-point specialist Matthew Wilson is shooting 42.0 percent (21-of-50) from behind the three-point line this season.
