Another Night, Another Game with Big Implications

Men's Basketball Schedule (All Times EST)
Green Bay at UIC, 8 p.m. -- HLN

Ordinarily, when a team from Green Bay visits Chicago, the reception is far from warm. However, when the Green Bay men's basketball team takes the court against UIC on Thursday night, they will have a robust cheering section at the UIC Pavilion.

With four natives of the city on the roster (transfer Alfonso McKinnie cannot make the trip due to NCAA regulations), Green Bay will enjoy some backing in what promises to be an intense environment on Chicago's West Side. Green Bay (11-10, 5-3 Horizon) enters the game having won five of its last six games, while UIC (13-8, 4-4 Horizon) has won two straight to even its Horizon League record.

Entering Thursday, Green Bay sits in a tie for third, while UIC is one game back in fifth; after the Phoenix gained a 53-47 win over the Flames on Jan. 12, tonight's game marks a chance for Green Bay to gain a key tie-breaker in a bunched League. For the Flames, the game marks an opportunity to continue finding its early-season form in which they generated buzz with wins over Colorado State and Northwestern.

Green Bay will turn to its inside-out tandem of Alec Brown and Keifer Sykes to try and control the game. Brown burst out with a career-high 23 points in the Phoenix's last game, a 74-54 win at Milwaukee. Meanwhile, Sykes returns home, where he starred at Marshall High School. Last year at the Pavilion, Sykes scored 27 points on 10-of-14 shooting.

Meanwhile, UIC will look to Gary Talton to remain the best closer in Chicago since Bobby Thigpen was toeing the rubber for the White Sox. While Talton ranks fifth in the conference in scoring at 15.3 points per game, it has been down the stretch where he has taken control. In the final 4:00 of play, Talton is shooting 8-for-9 from the floor, a perfect 3-for-3 from three-point range and 13-of-15 at the free-throw line. Twice, Talton has hit the eventual game-winning basket, hitting winners versus Loyola and Milwaukee.

Both defenses will be out to capitalize on offenses that have struggled at times. Green Bay owns the best defensive effective field-goal percentage in conference play at 41.6, while UIC comes into tonight with an effective field-goal percentage of 42.9 in League games. Meanwhile, Green Bay's 22.7-percent turnover rate is last in the conference.