ROLLA, Mo. – With its five-day, three-game stretch away from home now in the rearview mirror, Missouri S&T's basketball team will return to Gibson Arena Thursday night to play host to Truman State before heading back on the road on Saturday in Great Lakes Valley Conference play.

The Miners, 11-6 overall and 5-4 in the GLVC, will host the Bulldogs at 7:30 p.m., and fans attending Thursday's game are encouraged to wear white as part of S&T's "Whiteout Night" at Gibson Arena.  Following the game with Truman, S&T will head on the road for its next two games – starting with Saturday's 3 p.m. contest at Quincy – before starting a home-heavy schedule over the final month of the campaign.

S&T went 1-2 on its trip that took it to Indianapolis, Lewis and Illinois Springfield, winning the middle game of that trip as it shot better than 57 percent in the first half to build a 16-point lead at Lewis and going on to beat the Flyers on their home court for the first time in program history.

However, the Miners – who still lead the GLVC in scoring heading into play this week – struggled to score in the other two games as they recorded their two lowest point totals in a game this season.  They will look to bounce back Thursday against a Truman team that completed a season sweep over Southwest Baptist with a 10-point victory over the Bearcats on Monday in Kirksville.

Julien Smith (Fort Worth, TX/Northwest) continues to lead the Miners in scoring for the season as he is averaging 17.2 points, which ranks second in the GLVC and has him among four S&T players in double figures for the season.  Lovell Williams (Rogers, MN/Maple Grove) is eighth in the conference with his average of 15.2 points per contest and is also ranked among the league leaders in assists and steals, while Ikenna Okeke (Bolingbrook, IL/Romeoville) is ranked 10^th in scoring with his mark of 14.9 points per game.

S&T's fourth double figure scorer is Kaden Froebe (Lincoln, IL/Lincoln), who is averaging 12.2 points per game and also ranks second in the GLVC in steals and third in field goal percentage at 59.4 percent, just ahead of Andrew Young's (Ballwin, MO/Marquette) mark of 59.3 percent and Williams' 58.8 mark.  The Miners are ranked second as a team in the GLVC in field goal percentage at 49.8 percent for the season.

ABOUT TRUMAN STATE: The Bulldogs enter Thursday's game sporting a 7-10 record on the year and 2-7 mark in the GLVC, but completed a season sweep of Southwest Baptist following their 81-71 win Monday behind 25 points from Elijah Hazekamp.  The junior forward, who leads Truman with an average of 14.6 points per game, connected six times from three-point range and has made a team-high 49 this season (fourth best in the GLVC) at a clip of 45.4 percent.

Hunter Strait, another veteran guard on the Bulldog roster, is averaging 10.8 points per game and freshman Xavier Hall is scoring 8.5 points per contest while leading the way with 64 assists.  Trey Shearer, who is scoring eight points per game, is shooting 40 percent from three-point range and has made 30 treys on the season.

ABOUT QUINCY: The Hawks entered the 2022-23 season under the direction of a new head coach, a retooled roster and lower expectations around the GLVC as they were picked near the bottom of the conference in the pre-season, but head into Thursday's game at Missouri-St. Louis in a tie for the lead in the conference race with Indianapolis at 7-2 and are 11-6 overall.  Quincy held onto its share of the lead with a buzzer-beating win Monday over Drury as Jamaurie Coakley scored right before the final buzzer to give the Hawks an 84-83 win.

Malik Hardmon, who led the Hawks in scoring in five straight games before missing Monday's contest, leads three Quincy players in double figures with an average of 13.7 points per game.  Paul Zilinskas is averaging 12.1 per game and Zion Richardson, who had 25 points in Monday's win, is scoring 11.9 per game; Zilinskas, Richardson and Isaiah Foster have all made at least 24 three-point baskets this season and Foster is shooting 43.8 percent from beyond the arc.