ROLLA, Mo. – Missouri S&T's men's basketball team hits the road for the final time in the 2018-19 season this weekend as the Miners will take on two of the Great Lakes Valley Conference's schools from the St. Louis area, beginning with Thursday's contest at Maryville University.

The Miners will face the Saints at 7:30 p.m. Thursday night before returning to St. Louis Saturday to close their road schedule with a 3 p.m. contest at the University of Missouri-St. Louis.  S&T will wrap up its regular season schedule next week with home games against William Jewell and Rockhurst.

Following their 63-53 loss Saturday to Drury in the final game of a five-game homestand, the Miners bring records of 4-18 overall and 2-12 in the GLVC into this week's action.  S&T was held to its season low in points Saturday, despite getting 13 points from Romain Louiserre (La Ferte Alais, France/Fredrick Fays) and 11 from Dulan Scott (Chicago, IL/Farragut Academy).

CJ Hedgepeth (Evansville, IN/Harrison) continues to lead the active Miner players in scoring with his average of 12 points per game – Jordan Newt (San Francisco, CA/Malibu), who has been out of the lineup since early December with an injury, has the highest average of 14.3 per game – while Scott is averaging 11.7 per contest and Jalen Myers (Shorewood, IL/Minooka) is just outside of double figures at 9.8 a game.

Louiserre enters the week as the Miners' top rebounder with 5.1 per game, while Hedgepeth leads S&T in both assists with 63 and steals with 33; the latter total ranks third in the GLVC.  Myers has a team-high 30 three-point baskets and has made them at a clip of 34.9 percent.

ABOUT MARYVILLE: The Saints enter the week ranked second in the GLVC in three-point shooting with a mark at 39.9 percent -- trailing only Southern Indiana in that category --- and are led by the duo of Chaz Glotta and Casey Teson, their top two scorers on the roster.  Glotta has made a team-high 68 treys this season, the fourth-most in the conference, while Teson has made 45 at a clip of 42.1 percent.

Teson, who is third in the GLVC in scoring with an average of 20 points per game, also leads the Saints with 63 assists and is one of the league's top free throw shooters at 88 percent on the year.  Glotta is the other double figure scorer for Maryville as he enters Thursday's contest averaging 11.9 points per game.

Not only do the Saints lead the GLVC in three-point shooting, they are also the top team in the conference at defending the three as opposing teams have made only 32.8 percent of their tries against them.  Maryville, who is 9-15 overall and 4-11 in GLVC play, has gone just 1-7 in games decided by five or fewer points this season but did pick up a 10-point win on the road last week at Indianapolis,

ABOUT MISSOURI-ST. LOUIS: Since beating Missouri S&T in Rolla on Feb. 7, the Tritons have lost three straight games to drop to 18-7 overall and 9-6 in the GLVC.  The most recent loss was a 69-64 setback on Saturday at Indianapolis, despite getting 20 points from Eric Dust.


The Tritons have their highest win total since the 2014-15 season and have done so on the strength of a defensive unit that has allowed the fourth-fewest points on average in the conference at 69.6 per game.  Opposing teams have made just 44.2 percent of their shots against the Tritons, who have also outrebounded their foes by over six boards per contest.
 
Johnathan Matthews leads UMSL with an average of 13.8 points per game and has done a good deal of his offensive work from beyond the three-point line, where he has connected 60 times at a rate of 44.1 percent.  Dust is also scoring in double figures at 11.1 points per game and is the Tritons' top rebounder with 5.4 a game, while Ronnie Carson is just below double figures at 9.5 points a game and Shane Wissink is the team's assist leader with 89.