Horizon League Men's Basketball Weekly Release (Jan. 18)
Men's Basketball Weekend Schedule (all times EST)
Saturday, Jan. 19
Cleveland State at Green Bay -- 2 p.m., HLN Game of the Week/ESPN3
UIC at Detroit -- 6:30 p.m., HLN
Youngstown State at Milwaukee -- 8 p.m., HLN
Wright State at Valparaiso -- 8:05 p.m., HLN
Sunday, Jan. 20
Loyola at Chicago State
INDIANAPOLIS -- After a Friday night off, all nine Horizon League men's basketball teams will take to the hardwood this weekend highlighted, by a matchup between top-ranked Wright State and No. 2 Valparaiso.
Both teams are coming off of come-from-behind wins: Wright State rallied to beat Loyola last Friday, highlighted by Reggie Arceneaux's game-winning 3-pointer, and Valpo erased a 22-point second-half deficit in Detroit on Thursday to end the Titans' 17-game home court winning streak, leading for only the final 17 seconds of the game after Ryan Broekhoff's free throws put the Crusaders ahead by one. The win moved Valparaiso into sole possession of second place in the Horizon League standings while the top-ranked Raiders are 4-0 in conference play, their best start since the 2005-06 season.
This matchup will help tell more about the Horizon League. Road wins are not easy to come by, but Valparaiso is coming off a sweep of a three-game roadtrip. The Crusaders will no doubt be energized to protect their homecourt, where they were beaten by Loyola on the first night of conference play but recovered to blow out Cleveland State for their first conference win.
Wright State, meanwhile, is hoping to replicate at least part of the success that the Crusaders saw on the road. The Raiders are in the midst of a brutal four-game roadtrip. After winning at Loyola and visiting Valpo, the Raiders will travel to Detroit and Youngstown State before playing in the Nutter Center again.
There are three other games on Saturday, as well, kicking off with the HLN Game of the Week as Cleveland State visits Green Bay.
After a slow start to the season, Green Bay has won six straight games at the Resch Center and three straight Horizon League games, including Thursday night's win over Youngstown State. With stars Keifer Sykes and Alec Brown held to 18 combined points and sophomore Greg Mays serving the first game of a three-game suspension, the Phoenix needed a strong showing from the bench last night -- and that's exactly what they got, as their reserves combined for 31 points, the most the Green Bay bench has scored against any Division I opponent this season.
Cleveland State, meanwhile, is still finding searching for its identity. After handing Detroit its first conference loss last Saturday, the Vikings fell in Milwaukee as the Panthers picked up their first conference win. It has been an up-and-down season for CSU: they're one game above .500 overall, but one game below .500 in Horizon League play and still searching for their first road win of the season.
Saturday's second game pits Youngstown State against Milwaukee as the Panthers try to defend their home court and their one-game Horizon League winning streak. As it has so often this season, Milwaukee relied on the 3-pointer in its win over Cleveland State -- and on Thursday it worked as the Panthers hit 48 percent of their shots from behind the arc, led by Austin Arians, who hit 5-of-9 treys and totaled a game-high 19 points.
Long-range shooting will be important for Milwaukee again on Saturday win YSU comes to town with the Horizon League's best shot-blocker in center Damian Eargle. Eargle had a pair of blocks in the Penguins' loss to Green Bay and averages 3.4 per game, two full blocks more than anyone else.
Youngstown State is another of those teams looking for an identity, at 9-8 overall but 1-3 in conference play. A win Saturday would be huge, but as the Panthers (and all the Horizon League so far) have proven, road wins will not come easy.
The other Saturday game will be nearly as important to the lay of the Horizon League as the matchup between Wright State and Valparaiso. Detroit, reeling from Valpo's come-from-behind win that broke the 17-game home winning streak, hosting UIC, which zoomed out to a 9-1 start this season before leveling out, now sitting a 2-3 in conference play but coming off a big win over Loyola in the Windy City Rivalry.
The important thing for Detroit will be to build off all of the positives from Thursday night's heartbreaker. For example, Nick Minnerath had a career night with 36 points -- the most in the Horizon League this season -- on 12-of-17 shooting, including 4-of-7 from behind the arc. And Doug Anderson added 17 points while Jason Calliste poured in 12. And although Ray McCallum scored only six points and committed five turnovers, he still dished out a game-high eight assists. He's not going to be held to single-digit scoring very often.
UIC, meanwhile, will look to build off its win over the Flames' in-city, in-conference rival and to maybe steal a road win against a team that has just been beaten at home. Gary Talton's game-winning runner with 1.7 seconds left could provide momentum and inspirations for the Flames going forward.
In the lone Sunday game, Loyola tries to recover from the loss against UIC with a late-season non-conference game against yet another intercity rival in Chicago State. Discounting conference play, the Horizon League is 2-0 against the city of Chicago this season: UIC beat Northwestern and Loyola beat DePaul.
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