ROLLA, Mo. – Missouri S&T's men's basketball team will head back to the road this week with an opportunity many teams never get – a chance to face the top-ranked team in the nation – as it will play two contests away from Gibson Arena.

The Miners have not face a No. 1 team in the polls since 1980, but will do so on Saturday when they take on Bellarmine in Louisville, Ky.  But before the Miners get their crack at the top-ranked team in the country, they will first head to Evansville, Ind., for a Thursday night clash with Southern Indiana at 7:30 p.m.

Missouri S&T is the midst of playing five games in a span of 10 days and played three of them over the past weekend, one of which resulted in its first conference win of the season Saturday when S&T knocked off McKendree.  On Monday, the Miners came up just short in a 75-74 loss to Indianapolis at Gibson Arena and will bring records of 3-12 overall and 1-6 in the GLVC into Thursday's contest.

CJ Hedgepeth (Evansville, IN/Harrison) recorded 17 points and seven assists in Monday's contest and enters play this weekend as the Miners' leading scorer among the active players with a mark of 12.2 points per game.  Hedgepeth, who also leads S&T with 50 assists and 27 steals, is the only Miner currently averaging in double figures other than Jordan Newt (San Francisco, CA/Malibu) (14.3 points per game), who has been out of the lineup with an injury.

Dulan Scott (Chicago, IL/Farragut Academy) is averaging 9.6 points per contest and Juwan Miller (Kitchener, Ont./Huron Heights) is averaging 9.3 per game while also pacing the Miners on the boards with 5.4 per contest.

ABOUT SOUTHERN INDIANA: The Screaming Eagles enter Thursday's game with wins in five of their last six contests, which has them in a tie for second place in the GLVC at 5-2.  USI is 13-4 overall and swept its two games in the Kansas City area by double figure margins last weekend, capped by a 98-79 win Saturday at William Jewell behind 29 points from Kobe Caldwell.

Alex Stein is the GLVC's third-leading scorer with an average of 21 points per game and has led USI in scoring 10 times, including the conference's best scoring performance of the season with 48 points in a November win over Lake Superior State.  Stein is also shooting 57.4 percent from the field and has made 52 percent of his three-point shots.

Caldwell, a transfer from Utah, is averaging 13.5 points per contest and leads the Screaming Eagles with 39 three-pointers (he is shooting 44.8 percent from beyond the arc), while Emmanuel Little has averaged 10.8 points and 7.4 rebounds a contest.  Josh Price is the fourth double figure scorer for USI at 10.1 points per game.

ABOUT BELLARMINE:  The top-ranked Knights enter the week as one of the two remaining undefeated teams in NCAA Division II (Northwest Missouri State is the other) and are the top defensive team in the conference, holding its opponents to 64.6 points per game and 42.8 percent shooting from the floor.  In addition, Bellarmine is second in the conference in scoring at 84.2 points per game, as it leads the nation in field goal percentage at 55.8 percent and is the fourth-best free throw shooting team at 80 percent.

Adam Eberhard scored 33 points in the Knights' 82-71 win at Rockhurst that improved them to 16-0 overall and 7-0 in the GLVC, as he leads the conference in scoring with an average of 21.6 points per game.  Eberhard is also the top shooter in the GLVC at 67.3 percent from the floor – which ranks third in the nation -- while teammate Alex Cook is second at 64.7 percent.

Chivarasky Corbett is averaging 13.3 points per game and ranks sixth in the conference in rebounding with a team-high 6.9 per game, while Ben Weyer is also averaging in double figures with 11.9 points per contest.

Bellarmine enters the week -- which includes a Thursday contest with Drury -- with the nation's longest home winning streak that stands at 65 consecutive games.  The 16 straight wins to open the season are the most in school history.