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LAS VEGAS - The IUPUI basketball team will begin the neutral site portion of the 2013 Continental Tires Las Vegas Invitational on Thanksgiving Day (Nov. 28) when the Jaguars square off with Gardner-Webb inside Orleans Arena (6,000). Thursday's game is slated to tip-off at 11:30 a.m. Pacific (2:30 Eastern) and can be heard on WNDE 1260 AM and on the free iHeartRadio app available on smartphones. Will Flemming (pxp) will call the action from courtside inside the Orleans. 

Thursday's game will be the first-ever meeting between the two schools. The Jagaurs will take on either Chattanooga or Morehead State on Friday in the fourth and final game of the Las Vegas Invite. 

IUPUI (1-5) is coming off a 78-64 loss at Missouri (5-0) on Monday night, despite a season-high 14 points off the bench from Ja'Rob McCallum. The Milwaukee-transfer hit 6-of-11 shots off the bench, including a pair of threes, against the SEC foe. Freshman Justus Stanback pumped in 11 points on 5-of-7 shooting off the bench and junior guard Ian Chiles led the starting five with 12 points. 

IUPUI fell behind 8-0 in the game's opening 2:23 as the host Tigers led from wire to wire. After trailing by 13 at the break, the Jaguars made things interesting by cutting the MU lead back to seven in the middle of the second half. Stanback missed a trey with 5:39 to play which would've made it a six-point game and Missouri responded with five quick points from guard Jordan Clarkson to quickly push the lead back to 14. MU's Jabari Brown scored a career-high 24 points, including five treys, and Clarkson scored 22. 

IUPUI shot 50 percent in the first half, but cooled to 13-of-33 in the second half to finish at 44 percent overall. Missouri, which came in among the national leaders in field goal shooting, connected on 51 percent overall and 8-of-19 (42.1 percent) from downtown. The Tigers cashed in in transition, outscoring the Jaguars 12-0 on fast break points. 

Senior Mitch Patton had eight points and seven rebounds and sophomore Marcellus Barksdale closed with nine boards and five assists. 

Heading into this week's two games, Chiles ranks second in The Summit in scoring at 18.0 points per game, while Barksdale is averaging a team-high 7.7 rebounds, with all but one having come off the defensive glass. Barksdale also has a team-high 26 assists and has blocked 12 shots, ranking third in The Summit. Patton is averaging 15.0 points and 7.2 rebounds a game, while shooting 50 percent from the floor in five games. The quartet of Chiles, Patton, Khufu Najee and Donovan Gibbs has scored 73 percent of the team's points after six games, even after the bench scoring 25 points at Missouri. 

Like IUPUI, Gardner-Webb (2-4) is coming off back-to-back losses to Northwestern and Missouri, albeit in opposite order. The Runnin' Bulldogs lost at Mizzou 72-63 last Saturday before falling at Northwestern, 72-59 on Monday. GWU (2-4) is led in scoring by Texas A&M-transfer Naji Hibbert (13.8 ppg) and junior forward Donta Harper (13.0 ppg). Rookie forward Jerome Hill is averaging 11 points and a team-high 6.5 boards per game and junior Tyler Strange handles the point guard duties, having delivered 34 assists in the season's first six games. 

Gardner-Webb has home wins over Jacksonville and Allen (S.C.), but is 0-4 away from home this season. 

The last time IUPUI played a game in Vegas, the Jaguars were left with some sweet memories. IUPUI participated in the 2010 Holiday Hoops Classic in December of that year at SouthPoint Arena. In game one, IUPUI pushed No. 7 San Diego State to the brink before falling 56-54. Alex Young missed a potential game-tying jumper with 17 seconds left and SDSU, led by current San Antonio Spur Kawhi Leonard, escaped with the win.