DAYTON, Ohio - The IUPUI basketball team will continue the arduous start to Horizon League play on Sunday (Dec. 30) when the Jaguars take on the league's preseason favorite Wright State (6-8, 0-1 HL) at 3:00 p.m. inside WSU's Nutter Center. The game will be broadcast on ESPN3 and can be heard on IUPUIJags.com as Morgan Adcock (pxp) is on the call.
IUPUI (8-6, 0-1 HL) comes in trying to snap a three-game skid, albeit against the reigning Horizon League champion. On Friday, IUPUI dropped a 92-77 decision at Northern Kentucky, despite putting five guys in double-digits. Sophomore
Jaylen Minnett led three reserves in double-figures off the bench with 14 and both
Nick Rogers and
Ahmed Ismail tallied 11 each. Junior
Camron Justice closed with 12 points and four assists and
Grant Weatherford closed with 10 points.
IUPUI fell behind 12-2 in the game's opening minutes before retaliating to knot the score at 16 all. However, NKU fired back to build a 51-30 lead by halftime. Head coach
Jason Gardner's team will face the league's top three picks according to the preseason polls, all on the road, to open league play.
QUOTABLE: "I'm disappointed in that we came out slow and we looked kind of lost at the start of the game. I don't know if we were shellshocked or what it was, but we dug ourselves a big hole and never really got out. I thought we played well in stretches, but in order to be in the top half of this league, we have to be able to lock in at both ends of the floor for 40 straight minutes. We definitely didn't do that tonight. We played hard, but we didn't always play smart tonight," Gardner said after Friday's loss.
UP NEXT: IUPUI will take on UIC next Friday night (Jan. 4) in a nationally televised game on ESPNU at 7:00 p.m. Eastern (6 Central).
QUICK NOTES (click here to access the full notes for Sunday's game):
JAGS FALLS AT NKU IN HORIZON LEAGUE OPENER
The IUPUI basketball team dropped its third straight game on Friday night (Dec. 30) as the Jaguars fell in its Horizon League opener at Northern Kentucky, 92-77. The Jaguars fell behind by as many as 21 points in the first half and never seriously challenged in the second half. The league's Preseason Player of the Year, Drew McDonald, finished with 24 points, 12 rebounds and connected on 9-of-11 at the free throw line to lead the Norse. The 92 points allowed were the most by an IUPUI opponent this season as NKU shot 54 percent from the field and outscored IUPUI 25-12 at the charity stripe.
NKU built a quick 12-2 lead in the opening minutes, only for the IUPUI bench to fuel a 14-4 run to knot the game at 16 all. However, NKU ran away from there, surging out to a 51-30 lead by halftime, capped by a 35-footer at the final horn.
Jaylen Minnett led five Jaguars in double-digits with 14 points off the bench and
Camron Justice added 12 points and four assists. Subs
Nick Rogers (11 points) and
Ahmed Ismail (11 points) also finished with double-digits off the Jaguars' bench and
Grant Weatherford tossed in 10. Tyler Sharpe had 16 for NKU and Dantez Walton knocked in 12.
Here are some other quick notes about Friday's game:
-IUPUI dropped to 0-3 against NKU since joining the Horizon League prior to last season.
-Justice's 12 points snapped his streak of consecutive 20-point games at four.
-The 51 first half points allowed were the most by an IUPUI opponent this year. In addition, NKU's 25 made free throws were the most by an IUPUI opponent this year as well.
-Five different IUPUI players collected at least two first half fouls, forcing the Jags to utilize some unusual lineups before the break.
MILESTONES
-Senior
Evan Hall enters play needing seven boards to become the 15th player in IUPUI history to grab 500 career rebounds.
-
Nick Rogers next assist with be the 100th of his IUPUI career.
-
Elyjah Goss grabbed his 200th rebound of his two-year career at NKU on Friday.
-Fifth-year senior
D.J. McCall played his 2,500th career minute at NKU.
STREAKS
Justice has scored in double-digits in
13 straight games.
Justice has made a three in
14 straight games.
Minnett has made a three in
17 straight games, dating back to last season.
McCall has started
41 straight games, dating back to last season.
A SKID OF THREE
IUPUI is amidst the team's first losing streak of the season, having dropped three straight coming into play. The Jaguars' defense has been the culprit as IUPUI has yielded 84.3 points per game in the three losses, including 92 at Northern Kentucky on Friday. Here are some more pivotal numbers from the three-game skid.
-IUPUI opponents are shooting a combined 51 percent (85-of-167) from the floor in the past three games while IUPUI is shooting just 40 percent (80-of-201) overall.
-After being outrebounded just three times in the season's opening 11 games, IUPUI has been outrebounded in three straight by an average of 3.7 boards per game.
-IUPUI, which ranks 13th in the country in both free throws made (230) and free throw attempts (329), ironically has been outscored at the foul line 60-44 during the three-game skid.
-Oddly, IUPUI has taken great care of the basketball during the three losses, averaging +5 in the turnover category in the three defeats.
HEAVY HITTERS
IUPUI is amidst one of the toughest opening stretches in Horizon League history, taking on the top three picks in the league's preseason polls, all on the road to open league play. The trio of Wright State, Northern Kentucky and UIC collected 39 of the 40 possible first-place votes and easily separated from the second tier of selections.
The Jaguars dropped the first of the trifecta at NKU, 92-77 on Friday.
FREE MONEY
IUPUI enters play ranked 13th in the country in free throws made (230) and 13th in free throw attempts (329). Junior
Camron Justice is 25th in free throws made (68) and 43rd in free throw percentage (88.2%).
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 6-3 this season when Justice scores 20-or-better. Justice was recently the first IUPUI player to score 20-or-more 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 11 of 14 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
After scoring in double-digits in just one of the first 10 games of the season, junior
Grant Weatherford has scored in double-digits in three of the Jaguars' most recent four games. In addition, his distribution has been incredible of late as he has 22 assists in the Jaguars' past six games against just two turnovers
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 10.1 points and 5.9 rebounds in the past nine games while shooting 32-of-50 (64%) 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 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.
