MOREHEAD, Ky. - The IUPUI basketball team will close out non-conference play on Friday night (Dec. 21) when the Jaguars take on Morehead State (3-8) at 5:35 p.m. inside MSU's Johnson Arena. The game will be broadcast on ESPN+.
IUPUI (8-4) dropped an 87-77 decision at Purdue Fort Wayne on Tuesday night as PFW's John Konchar erupted for 30 points, 10 rebounds and four assists and fellow senior Kason Harrell added 20. IUPUI junior
Camron Justice had a team-high 25 points and
Grant Weatherford contributed a career-high 20 points, six boards and three assists. Weatherford comes in averaging 16.5 points per game in the past two ballgames and has handed out 18 assists against just one turnover in the Jaguars' past four games.
Justice continued his prolific scoring and has climbed to 29th nationally at 21.1 points per game. The Kentucky-native has scored 20-or-more eight times this season and led the Jaguars in scoring in 10 of the team's 12 games. He also ranks 22nd nationally in free throws made (61) and 30th in free throw percentage (89.7 percent). Justice comes in having scored 20-or-more in three straight games and could become the first IUPUI player since January 2012 to hit for 20-or-more in four straight games. That season, Alex Young ripped off games of 27, 27, 26 and 22 in succession.
Justice and senior
Evan Hall are expecting large contingents of fans on Friday as both grew up in Hindman, Ky., located just less than 100 miles south of Morehead.
QUOTABLE: "I told our guys, it's really hard to win on the road. You have to be sharper, crisper and all around better than what we were tonight to win on the road. We came out strong, but we missed some shots that we ordinarily make and it kind of snowballed from there. We never really got our post guys going tonight and that makes it harder on our guards to get loose when we can't get buckets in close," head coach Jason Gardner said following the PFW game.
UP NEXT: IUPUI will open Horizon League play at Northern Kentucky next Friday night (Dec. 28) at 7:00 p.m. on ESPN+. That game will also be heard on IUPUIJags.com as Morgan Adcock (pxp) is on the call.
QUICK NOTES (click here to access the full notes for Friday's game):
JAGS HIT THE SKIDS IN FORT WAYNE
IUPUI's second three-game winning streak of the season came to a halt to the hands of Purdue Fort Wayne on Tuesday night (Dec. 18), 87-77.
Camron Justice led three Jaguars in double-digits with 25 points and junior
Grant Weatherford added a career-high 20 points and six boards, but it wasn't enough to offset the 30 points from PFW's John Konchar and 20 from Kason Harrell.
IUPUI jumped out to a 16-6 lead in the game's opening stages, but went silent offensively from there, allowing Purdue Fort Wayne to rip off a 20-4 run at one point to turn the tables. IUPUI shot just 39 percent for the game while the hosts knocked in 55 percent overall and 88 percent at the foul line. IUPUI made just 18-of-45 (40 percent) attempts inside the arc, while allowing the Mastodons to shoot 21-of-28 (75 percent) from two-point range.
The Jaguars' 87 points allowed were the most by an opponent this season.
Here are some other notes from Tuesday night's loss:
-Justice led the Jaguars in scoring for the tenth time in 12 games on the season and has scored 20-or-more in three straight and eight of 12 games. Justice was held to a season-low one free throw attempt.
-Weatherford pumped in an efficient 20 (6-10 FG, 1-2 3's, 7-7 FT) to go along with six boards, three assists and two steals.
-Sophomore
Jaylen Minnett came off the Jaguars' bench to score 13 points, albeit on just 4-of-14 shooting. The Terre Haute-native attempted a career-high five free throws, making three.
-Freshman
Jack Hansen played his most productive minutes of late, contributing eight points and three boards in just 16 minutes.
-The Jaguars' frontcourt group of
Evan Hall,
Elyjah Goss and
Ahmed Ismail came in averaging 25.4 points and 17.2 rebounds per game, but was limited to a combined five points on 2-of-13 shooting on Tuesday night.
A HOMECOMING, OF SORTS
Tonight's game is a bit of a homecoming for both
Evan Hall and
Camron Justice as the duo grew up roughly 100 miles south of Morehead in Hindman, Ky. (population 712). The duo is expecting anywhere from 50 to 100 fans, friends and family members to make the trek to tonight's game - roughly a 2-hour drive north.
AGAINST THE EAGLES
IUPUI improved to 3-0 over Morehead State last season, defeating the Eagles 67-61 in Indianapolis to kickoff the home-and-home series. Notable stat lines from IUPUI returners in that game included:
Evan Hall (6 pts, 3-8 FG)
D.J. McCall (8 pts, 4 reb, 3 ast, 2 stl)
Jaylen Minnett (11 pts, 2 ast)
Elyjah Goss (4 pts, 4 reb)
Nick Rogers (0 pts, 2 reb, 2 ast)
IUPUI built a 13-2 lead in that game and never trailed in the wire-to-wire win over the Eagles.
FREE MONEY
IUPUI enters play ranked 17th in the country in free throws made (203) and 22nd in free throw attempts (285). Junior
Camron Justice is 22nd in free throws made (61) and 30th in free throw percentage (89.7%).
Justice has done unprecedented damage at the free throw line already this season, boasting a pair of games with double-digit makes and no misses. He went 13-for-13 at Boston College, tying for the fourth most makes in a game in program history without a miss. He upped the ante against Bradley, hitting 15 without a miss, giving him the third highest total in school history without a miss (tops in the D1 era).
HE GO, WE GO - JUSTICE NOTES
-In this instance, he being
Camron Justice. IUPUI is 6-2 this season when Justice scores 20-or-better and Justice is averaging 22.1 points per game in the Jaguars' eight victories. In the three losses, Justice is averaging 19 points per game.
-Justice was recently the first IUPUI player to score 20-or-more in three straight games since Darell Combs did it three times from Feb. 20-27, 2016. Should Justice hit for 20-or-more tonight, he'll be the first Jag to do it in four straight games since Jan. 14-28, 2012 when Alex Young went for 27-27-26-22 in a four-game span.
-The Kentucky-native has led IUPUI in scoring in nine of 11 games after being held to just nine points in the season opener. In that game, he had just nine points before he was ejected midway through the first half for tripping an opponent, which was called a flagrant 1 foul.
GRANT PAYING DIVIDENDS
Junior
Grant Weatherford has been coming on strong of late, specifically finding his scoring touch the past two games. After scoring double-digits just once in the season's first 10 games, Weatherford has hit for double-digits in each of the past two games, averaging 16.5 points and hitting 14-of-15 (93.3%) free throw attempts during that span.
His distribution has been incredible as he has 18 assists in the Jaguars' past four games against just one turnover.
Weatherford has been efficient offensively all season long and is shooting 58 percent from the floor and 79.5 percent from the foul line so far this season.
CALL ME ISMAIL
After a slow start to his IUPUI career, senior center
Ahmed Ismail is now making his presence felt off the Jaguars' bench. Ismail scored just 10 points total in his first five IUPUI games, but is since averaging 10.9 points and 6.0 rebounds in the past seven games while shooting 26-of-40 (65%) from the floor.
BEST START SINCE...
The Jags' 8-3 start was the program's best start in head coach Jason Gardner's five seasons and best start since the 2009-10 season. That squad finished 25-11 overall and earned a spot in the CBI that season. This marks the first time Gardner has had IUPUI above .500 beyond the fourth game of any of his five seasons.
ROLLING ON DUBS
IUPUI has points-rebounds double-doubles from three different players this season as
Elyjah Goss,
Evan Hall and
Ahmed Ismail have all pulled the trick. For perspective, IUPUI is the only team in the Horizon League to have three different players with points-rebounds double-doubles this season and IUPUI hasn't had three different players get double-doubles in a season since 2013-14 when four different players registered at least one (Marcellus Barksdale, Donovan Gibbs, Khufu Najee & Mitch Patton).
BLOW OUT THE CANDLES
Head coach Jason Gardner celebrated his 38th birthday in style, collecting his 50th career head coaching win at Boston College on November 14. The win was the Jaguars' first over an ACC opponent since 2001 and first over a Power 5 school since winning at Seton Hall in 2009.
Gardner is third on the program's all-time wins list at 56, but is a far cry from the top two in program history. Current Georgia State head coach Ron Hunter (275) and IUPUI Hall of Famer Bob Lovell (195) own the top two spots in program history.
SHARING THE WEALTH
IUPUI has had nine different players have hit for 10-or-more points at least once this season.
Nick Rogers became the most recent player to tally double-digits, joining a group that includes
Elyjah Goss,
Evan Hall,
Jack Hansen,
Ahmed Ismail,
Camron Justice,
D.J. McCall,
Jaylen Minnett and
Grant Weatherford.
