By: John Kean, Sports Information Director
ROLLA, Mo. – With a successful homestand now in the books, Missouri S&T's men's basketball team will head to the road for its next four games with the first task being to extend its four-game winning streak against an equally hot team, Truman State, when the teams collide Thursday in Kirksville, Mo., at 7:30 p.m.
The Miners' weekend road trip will continue Saturday with a 3:15 p.m. at Quincy University and then the Miners play on the road next weekend at Illinois Springfield and McKendree before returning to their home court on Feb. 13 to face Lewis.
Thursday's matchup between the Miners and Bulldogs – who resided together in the same conference for a 70-year span as members of the Mid-America Intercollegiate Athletics Association – will be the first between the teams in men's basketball in the Great Lakes Valley Conference. It will pit a Miner team that has moved over the .500 mark on the season with its recent winning streak against a Truman squad that is seeking its seventh consecutive victory.
Missouri S&T (9-8, 4-5 GLVC) earned its fourth straight win by rallying from a 10-point deficit midway through the second half for an 85-79 victory Saturday over Missouri-St. Louis.
Mudiaga Eruteya (Chicago, Ill./Notre Dame) and
Bryce Foster (Florissant, Mo./Hazelwood Central) recorded double-doubles for the Miners, as Eruteya had a game-high 27 points and 10 rebounds which included two free throws with 2:04 to play to put S&T in the lead for good.
Foster, who had 21 points and 13 boards against UMSL, is second in the GLVC in scoring as the week begins with his average of 21 points per contest, while Eruteya is averaging 18.3 points a game and
Nusrath Khan (Morton Grove, Ill./Maine East) is at 14.6 per game. Eruteya and Khan are also ranked first and second, respectively, in the conference in steals as the Miners rank 15
th in NCAA Division II in that category.
The Miners also rank sixth in the nation in scoring with a league-high 90.9 points per game, but will be challenged by one of the stingiest teams in the GLVC on both ends of the floor. The Bulldogs have allowed a league-low 64.5 points a contest as teams are shooting only 33.1 percent from beyond the arc against them, while on the offensive side, Truman has committed the fifth-fewest turnovers in the nation per game.
Mike Carlson has been a force for the Bulldogs (14-3, 7-2 GLVC) all season as he is fourth in the conference in scoring with an average of 20.1 points per game; he also leads Truman in rebounding and blocked shots. The Bulldogs are also getting 13.4 points a game from Seth Jackson and 11.2 a game from Reed Mells, who is third in the league in assists and right behind the Miner duo that tops the steals list.
Saturday's opponent, Quincy, is 7-12 overall and 2-7 in the GLVC heading into Thursday's home contest with fifth-ranked Drury. The Hawks snapped a four-game losing streak Saturday with a 73-65 win at Rockhurst behind 18 points from their leading scorer, Chris Babbitt, who is averaging 16 points per outing.
Babbitt is the lone active player on the Hawks' roster averaging in double figures, as Evan McGaughey is scoring 9.3 points a game while Dalton Hoover and Austin Weber are scoring a little over seven points per contest. QU's second-leading scorer, Scottie Bruxvoort, was granted a leave of absence from the team following the Hawks' game last Thursday at William Jewell. Bruxvoort is scoring 10.5 points a game on the year.
Quincy has lost five of its 12 games by three points or less this season.
Game Notes: Miners vs. Truman State
Game Notes: Miners vs. Quincy
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