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| Rodriguez and the Bucs head to Statesboro winners of four straight |
Teams: ETSU (5-2) at Georgia Southern (5-0)
Venue: Hanner Fieldhouse (3,897)/Statesboro, GA
Time: 7 p.m.
Series: Georgia Southern leads 18-13
Coaches: Georgia Southern--Mark Byington (95-72/6th season at GSU)/ ETSU--Steve Forbes (81-31/4th season at ETSU)
ETSU (5-2) head coach Steve Forbes called his team’s 79-61 win over North Dakota State its “most complete” performance of the season, and Bucs fans will hope that kind of effort will carry over into Tuesday night’s showdown with former Southern Conference rival at Georgia Southern (5-0) ahead of ETSU’s blockbuster SoCon opener at Wofford (5-2).
The Eagles and Bucs are slated to tip things off down at Hanner Fieldhouse at 7 p.m. in another important SoCon vs. Sun Belt tilt. ETSU opened the season in the Peach State coming up just short against the SBC preseason favorite Georgia State, 74-68, to open the 2018-19 season down down in Atlanta.
Tuesday night’s game between the Bucs and Eagles rekindles an old Southern Conference rivalry, as the two teams will be meeting on the college basketball hardwood for the 32nd time, with the Eagles one of the few teams to actually hold a series edge advantage against the Bucs, despite ETSU’s great tradition, leading the all-time series, 18-13. ETSU get the best of the two teams last season in Johnson City, posting a 79-59 win.
The Eagles and Bucs have met in some classics over the years, including a game that would see the two meet in the 2001 SoCon quarterfinals, with the North Division champion and co-regular-season SoCon regular-season champion Bucs dropping a 72-64 decision at the BI-LO Center in Greenville, S.C., in what was a league tournament that saw its fair share of upsets to lower-seeded opposition. The likes of DiMeco Childress and a young Zakee Wadood and Jerald Fields would have to wait another couple of years for revenge, returning to the NCAA Tournament in 2003 for the first time since the mid-1990s.
The Eagles are off to a 5-0 start and appear once again to be a threat to steal Georgia State’s title trophy. The Eagles were ranked 26th nationally in the first releasing of the first edition of the college basketball net rankings, which is a formula that has now replaced the old “Ratings-Per-Index” formula or “RPI” for the foreseeable future. The Eagles have picked up wins over Carver Bible College (139-51), George Mason (98-89), Florida Atlantic (80-70), Pepperdine (88-78) and maybe its best win so far--an 80-77 win over Montana in a rematch of the 2000 Division I-AA Football National Championship game.
Since leaving the Southern Conference following the 2013-14 season for the Sun Belt, the Eagles have flirted with the program’s first NCAA Tournament appearance since 1992. In its two decades as a Southern Conference member, the Eagles never made it past the semifinal round of the league tournament. Byington is 95-72 in his sixth season at the helm of the Georgia Southern basketball program. He might have his best team this season.
The Eagles have one of the top guards in the mid-major ranks, and a candidate for Sun Belt Player of the Year, in 5-11 senior point guard Tookie Brown (18.2 PPG, 4.0 RPG, 4.8 APG). Brown needs just 62 more points this season to become the program’s all-time leading scorer in its Division I era, as he would surpass former Southern Conference standout guard Julius Jenkins (1,870 pts), who starred for the Eagles from 1999-2003, and was part of that team that handed the Bucs that tournament upset back in 2001.
Brown, who is the reigning Sun Belt Player of the Week, capped his weekly award garnering performance with 22 points, six rebounds and four assist to help the Eagles to a key 80-77 win over Big Sky favorite Montana.
Brown will team with David Lee-Jones (11.2 PPG, 2.6 RPG) and Ike Smith (15.6 PPG, 5.4 RPG) as the starting guards in the backcourt. The trio forms one of the top backcourts in the Sun Belt, and that rivals preseason Sun Belt favorite Georgia State. The trio of starters in the backcourt averages 45 of Georgia Southern’s Sun Belt leading 97.0 PPG.
ETSU counters with an impressive and athletic backcourt trio of its own, which includes preseason All-SoCon performer Tray Boyd III (12.7 PPG, 1.9 RPG, 1.7 APG), as well as Appalachian State transfer Patrick Good (10.0 PPG, 2.4 RPG), who the Eagles will be a little be a little bit familiar with. JUCO transfer Isaiah Tisdale (10.7 PPG, 3.6 APG) has been arguably the best of the trio of guards early on this season for the Bucs, and he’ll run the point and likely draw the task of trying to slow GSU’s Brown.
Boyd is the team’s second most prolific perimeter threat, having canned 17 triples this season. Good leads the team with 23 three-pointers this season. Boyd posted a career-high 23 points in a recent win over Sam Houston State. The Bucs have been without preseason All-SoCon sophomore guard Bo Hodges (10.7 PPG, 2.7 APG, 2.7 RPG) the past four games. He has not practiced since his undisclosed injury, and will likely not play tonight. Boyd has started the past three games in the backcourt for ETSU.
The two starters in the frontcourt for the Eagles will be both 6-7 junior Isaiah Crawley (8.4 PPG, 4.4 RPG) and 6-8 senior Montae Glenn (12.8 PPG, 8.0 RPG) Glenn has over 500-career rebounds, and will have his hands full tonight against one of the best rebouding clubs in mid-major hoops. Crawley missed the entire second half against Montana with an injury, but should return tonight.
Most of the Bucs success in the early portion of the season has come as a result of the play of 6-8 redshirt junior forward Jeromy Rodriguez (11.7 PPG, 11.9 RPG). He’ll team with 6-10 sophomore Mladen Armus (10.4 PPG, 10. RPG) in the paint, who have helped the Bucs produce an eye-popping and league leading +16.3 rebounding margin through the early portion of the season. Rodriguez has been one of the best newcomers in the SoCon so far this season.
Why the Importance: Given the early season success for Furman and Wofford, ETSU needs this win, and if the Bucs could get it, it would rank as ETSU’s best win of the season to this point.
ETSU (5-2) head coach Steve Forbes called his team’s 79-61 win over North Dakota State its “most complete” performance of the season, and Bucs fans will hope that kind of effort will carry over into Tuesday night’s showdown with former Southern Conference rival at Georgia Southern (5-0) ahead of ETSU’s blockbuster SoCon opener at Wofford (5-2).
The Eagles and Bucs are slated to tip things off down at Hanner Fieldhouse at 7 p.m. in another important SoCon vs. Sun Belt tilt. ETSU opened the season in the Peach State coming up just short against the SBC preseason favorite Georgia State, 74-68, to open the 2018-19 season down down in Atlanta.
Tuesday night’s game between the Bucs and Eagles rekindles an old Southern Conference rivalry, as the two teams will be meeting on the college basketball hardwood for the 32nd time, with the Eagles one of the few teams to actually hold a series edge advantage against the Bucs, despite ETSU’s great tradition, leading the all-time series, 18-13. ETSU get the best of the two teams last season in Johnson City, posting a 79-59 win.
The Eagles and Bucs have met in some classics over the years, including a game that would see the two meet in the 2001 SoCon quarterfinals, with the North Division champion and co-regular-season SoCon regular-season champion Bucs dropping a 72-64 decision at the BI-LO Center in Greenville, S.C., in what was a league tournament that saw its fair share of upsets to lower-seeded opposition. The likes of DiMeco Childress and a young Zakee Wadood and Jerald Fields would have to wait another couple of years for revenge, returning to the NCAA Tournament in 2003 for the first time since the mid-1990s.
The Eagles are off to a 5-0 start and appear once again to be a threat to steal Georgia State’s title trophy. The Eagles were ranked 26th nationally in the first releasing of the first edition of the college basketball net rankings, which is a formula that has now replaced the old “Ratings-Per-Index” formula or “RPI” for the foreseeable future. The Eagles have picked up wins over Carver Bible College (139-51), George Mason (98-89), Florida Atlantic (80-70), Pepperdine (88-78) and maybe its best win so far--an 80-77 win over Montana in a rematch of the 2000 Division I-AA Football National Championship game.
Since leaving the Southern Conference following the 2013-14 season for the Sun Belt, the Eagles have flirted with the program’s first NCAA Tournament appearance since 1992. In its two decades as a Southern Conference member, the Eagles never made it past the semifinal round of the league tournament. Byington is 95-72 in his sixth season at the helm of the Georgia Southern basketball program. He might have his best team this season.
The Eagles have one of the top guards in the mid-major ranks, and a candidate for Sun Belt Player of the Year, in 5-11 senior point guard Tookie Brown (18.2 PPG, 4.0 RPG, 4.8 APG). Brown needs just 62 more points this season to become the program’s all-time leading scorer in its Division I era, as he would surpass former Southern Conference standout guard Julius Jenkins (1,870 pts), who starred for the Eagles from 1999-2003, and was part of that team that handed the Bucs that tournament upset back in 2001.
Brown, who is the reigning Sun Belt Player of the Week, capped his weekly award garnering performance with 22 points, six rebounds and four assist to help the Eagles to a key 80-77 win over Big Sky favorite Montana.
Brown will team with David Lee-Jones (11.2 PPG, 2.6 RPG) and Ike Smith (15.6 PPG, 5.4 RPG) as the starting guards in the backcourt. The trio forms one of the top backcourts in the Sun Belt, and that rivals preseason Sun Belt favorite Georgia State. The trio of starters in the backcourt averages 45 of Georgia Southern’s Sun Belt leading 97.0 PPG.
ETSU counters with an impressive and athletic backcourt trio of its own, which includes preseason All-SoCon performer Tray Boyd III (12.7 PPG, 1.9 RPG, 1.7 APG), as well as Appalachian State transfer Patrick Good (10.0 PPG, 2.4 RPG), who the Eagles will be a little be a little bit familiar with. JUCO transfer Isaiah Tisdale (10.7 PPG, 3.6 APG) has been arguably the best of the trio of guards early on this season for the Bucs, and he’ll run the point and likely draw the task of trying to slow GSU’s Brown.
Boyd is the team’s second most prolific perimeter threat, having canned 17 triples this season. Good leads the team with 23 three-pointers this season. Boyd posted a career-high 23 points in a recent win over Sam Houston State. The Bucs have been without preseason All-SoCon sophomore guard Bo Hodges (10.7 PPG, 2.7 APG, 2.7 RPG) the past four games. He has not practiced since his undisclosed injury, and will likely not play tonight. Boyd has started the past three games in the backcourt for ETSU.
The two starters in the frontcourt for the Eagles will be both 6-7 junior Isaiah Crawley (8.4 PPG, 4.4 RPG) and 6-8 senior Montae Glenn (12.8 PPG, 8.0 RPG) Glenn has over 500-career rebounds, and will have his hands full tonight against one of the best rebouding clubs in mid-major hoops. Crawley missed the entire second half against Montana with an injury, but should return tonight.
Most of the Bucs success in the early portion of the season has come as a result of the play of 6-8 redshirt junior forward Jeromy Rodriguez (11.7 PPG, 11.9 RPG). He’ll team with 6-10 sophomore Mladen Armus (10.4 PPG, 10. RPG) in the paint, who have helped the Bucs produce an eye-popping and league leading +16.3 rebounding margin through the early portion of the season. Rodriguez has been one of the best newcomers in the SoCon so far this season.
Why the Importance: Given the early season success for Furman and Wofford, ETSU needs this win, and if the Bucs could get it, it would rank as ETSU’s best win of the season to this point.
Who Wins: ETSU 75, Georgia Southern 71
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