INDIANAPOLIS - The IUPUI basketball team will return to post-Thanksgiving holiday action on Saturday night (Nov. 30) when the Jaguars host Evansville (4-3) at 7:00 p.m. inside Indiana Farmers Coliseum. Saturday's game will be seen on ESPN+ as Scott McCauley (pxp) and Bob Lovell (analyst) describe the action. In addition, tickets are still available via TicketMaster or by visiting the Coliseum box office during normal business hours. The Jags will look to snap a three-game skid after back-to-back tight losses to Loyola (Md.) and Southern in Omaha earlier this week as part of The Mainland Tournament at Omaha of the Cayman Islands Classic. 

Junior Marcus Burk averaged 29.5 points per game and connected on 13 threes in the two games and comes in having scored 20-or-better in the Jags' last five games. The Indianapolis-native ranks seventh nationally in scoring at 23.6 points per game and also ranks among the nation's leaders in threes made (29) and three-point percentage (46.8%). 

Fellow junior Jaylen Minnett checks in at 11.7 points per game and is hitting 2.7 treys per game. 

Evansville, under head coach Walter McCarty, captured America's attention with a 67-64 win at then No. 1 Kentucky on Nov. 12. KJ Riley leads Evansville in scoring at 16.9 points per game and Artur Labinowicz and DeAndre Williams both tally 12.7 points per game. Riley has a team-high 18 assists while Williams has a team-high 6.0 rebounds per game and is shooting 63.6 percent from the floor. 

PROBABLE STARTERS
G- Jaylen Minnett (6-1, Jr.) - 11.7 ppg, 4.4 rpg, 34.5 3FG%
G- Mike DePersia (5-11, Fr.) - 3.1 ppg, 2.6 rpg
G- Marcus Burk (6-3, Jr.) - 23.6 ppg, 3.9 rpg, 46.8 3FG%
F- Zo Tyson (6-9, Gr.) - 4.6 ppg, 3.4 rpg, 70.0 FG%
F- Elyjah Goss (6-7, Jr.) - 7.1 ppg, 6.9 rpg

KEY RESERVES
G/F- Jamil Jackson Jr. (6-6, Jr.) - 2.7 ppg, 1.0 rpg
F- Isaiah Williams (6-8, Jr.) - 8.1 ppg, 4.7 rpg
G- Grant Weatherford (6-2, Jr.) - 4.1 ppg, 3.4 rpg, 3.0 apg

SERIES NOTES: IUPUI is 0-3 all-time against Evansville, having lost games to the Aces in 1999, 2013 and 2014. The most recent meeting was an 89-62 Evansville win at UE's Ford Center on Dec. 6, 2014.   

PRESEASON PICKS: IUPUI was picked to finish ninth in the Horizon League Preseason Polls, just ahead of Cleveland State. Wright State was a near unanimous pick for the league title while Northern Kentucky was picked second. Detroit Mercy sophomore guard Antoine Davis was pegged the league's Preseason Player of the Year and joined on the first team by Jalen Tate (NKU), Xavier Hill-Mais (Oakland), Tarkus Ferguson (UIC) and Loudon Love (Wright State). 

    BURK'S BEEN BALLIN'
    Junior Marcus Burk has been on a tear all season long, ranking No. 7 nationally in scoring (23.6 ppg) and No. 3 in the country in threes made per game (4.14/game). His current streak of five straight games of scoring 20-or-more is the longest by an IUPUI player since Robert Glenn did the same from Feb. 6-20, 2010. 
    Here are some more notes on Burk to start the season:
    -Burk tallied a season-high 32 points (12-of-21 FG, 7-of-10 3's) against Loyola (Md.) on Monday night, falling one shy of his career-high 33 from his sophomore year at Campbell. Burk's 32 was the most by an IUPUI player since Darell Combs hit the same number against South Dakota on Feb. 25, 2016. 
    -Burk is averaging 13.4 points per game in the first half of games this season, while shooting 54 percent (19-of-35) from three-point range. He scored 23 points before halftime in the win over Anderson and also has first half totals of 17 at Loyola (Ill.) and 16 vs. Loyola (Md.) on Monday night (Nov. 25). 
    -While Burk is off to a hot start and averaging better than 20 points per game to start the year, no IUPUI player has averaged 20 points per game for an entire season since Alex Young averaged 20.4 points per game in 2011-12. Only three players - Odell Bradley (23.1, 2003-04), George Hill (21.5, 2007-08) and Young (20.4, 2011-12) - have averaged better than 20 points per game during the Jaguars' Division I era. 
    -Burk enters tonight with 941 points in his collegiate career - 776 in two seasons at Campbell and 165 in an IUPUI uniform. 

    SPLASH BROTHERS
    IUPUI's version of the Splash Brothers - Marcus Burk and Jaylen Minnett - has been impressive to start the season, both ranking among the Horizon League's top five in both threes made and three-point percentage. 
    Burk leads the league in three per game (4.1) while Minnett is third in the league in the category (2.7). Burk leads in three-point percentage (46.8%) and Minnett is also among the top five at 34.5 percent. By hitting a combined 6.8 three/game, the duo is easily tops in the league for a tandem. 

    TOP GUNS
    Burk and Minnett are accounting for the bulk of the Jaguars' offense through the season's first seven games, having taken 53 percent of the team's field goal attempts (210 of 400) and 76 percent of the team's three-point attempts (117-of-154). In addition, the duo has accounted for 54 percent (247 of 461) of the team's total points. 
    Burk (23.6 ppg) and Minnett (11.7 ppg) easily lead the team in scoring while Isaiah Williams is third at 8.1 ppg. 

    FINDING DUBS
    While Burk has scored in double-digits in all seven games to start the season, the remainder of the IUPUI roster has just eight double-digit scoring games combined. Minnett has scored in double-figures four times, Elyjah Goss has done so three times and Isaiah Williams has hit double-figures once. 

    MINNETT NOTES
    Junior Jaylen Minnett, the 2019 Horizon League Sixth Man of the Year, is unlikely to be a repeat winner of the award as he's assumed a starting job this season. The 6-foot-1 Terre Haute-native, averaged 12.0 points per game and drilled 78 3's last season, while coming off the bench in all but the season finale. 
     Some other tidbits on Minnett include: 
    -He currently owns the nation's fourth-longest streak of consecutive games with at least one made three at 43 games... Minnett made at least one trey in all 33 games last season and the final three games of the 2017-18 season... the last time Minnett went without a three in a game was against Oakland on Feb. 19, 2018 when he was held without a triple in 14 minutes. 
    -Minnett enters play ranked eighth on IUPUI's all-time list with 148 made 3's in his career...he has some work to do to move up on the list as both Leroy Nobles and Akeem Clark are tied for the No. 6 spot with 186 makes each.
    -His 78 3's made last season was the 7th-highest single-season total in IUPUI history. 
    -His 7.1 ppg scoring average as a freshman in 2017-18 was the highest by an IUPUI rookie since Alex Young average 10.8 points per game in 2008-09.
    -His 51 made 3's in 2017-18 were the most by an IUPUI freshman in the program's Division I era (1998-present).  

    MR. DOUBLE-DOUBLE
    Junior Elyjah Goss notched his second double-double of the season on Monday night, notching a season-high 14 points (5-of-9 FG, 4-6 FT) and matching his career-high with 13 boards (6 offensive) against Loyola (Md.). Goss logged his fifth career double-double and is the only active IUPUI player to own a collegiate double-double. 
    Goss has quietly upped his scoring (6.8 ppg to 7.1 ppg) and rebounding (6.3 rpg to 6.9 rpg), despite his minutes per game being slightly lower this season (22.9 mpg to 21.4 mpg).

    SOUTHERN TIDBITS
    Isaiah Williams scored 12 of his season-high 13 points (4-7 FG, 5-8 FT) in the first half of Tuesday's loss to Southern, to go along with six rebounds... senior Zo Tyson matched his season-high of eight points, while also posting new career-highs in rebounds (6) and blocked shots (3)... freshman Mike DePersia had a season-high seven points (2-4 FG, 3-5 FT) in 26 minutes... IUPUI led by as many as 10 in the first half and had a four-point halftime lead, but was outscored 45-35 in the second half... junior Jaylen Minnett made a three for a 43rd straight game, extending the nation's fourth-longest active streak. 

    STORY TELLER
    In IUPUI's two wins this season, the Jags have held opponents to 34 percent shooting overall and 19 percent from three-point range. 
    In the Jaguars' four losses, foes have shot 54.9 percent overall and 43 percent from beyond the arc. 
    Four of the five opponents to have beaten the Jags have shot 50 percent or better from the floor and the fifth, Bradley, shot 47.8 percent in the win. 
    In the Jags' two wins - IUPUI held Anderson to just 32.4 percent shooting and South Florida to 37 percent. 

BASKETBALL CENTRAL: IUPUI will be a big part of the center of the college basketball universe this March as the 2020 Horizon League Championships will be played at the Indiana Farmers Coliseum on Mar. 9-10 and the department will later serve as institutional co-host of an NCAA Men's Basketball Regional at Lucas Oil Stadium on Mar. 26-28, alongside the Horizon League and Indiana Sports Corporation. Both the men's and women's Horizon League Semifinals (Mar. 9) and Championship games (Mar. 10) will be played at Indiana Farmers Coliseum as 2020 marks the first of a three-year rotation.