Men’s hoops to clash with Miami (Ohio)

By Brian Earle

Men’s basketball will look to win its third consecutive conference game when it hosts Miami (Ohio) at 6 p.m. today at the Convocation Center.

The Huskies (9-11, 3-5 MAC) are coming off consecutive wins via the comeback fashion, defeating Kent State after trailing by 14 and coming back from down 15 to defeat Ball State.

“It’d be a lot better if we didn’t go down 14 or 15 points; that would make things a lot easier if we could just play with that edge the entire game,” said redshirt junior center Jordan Threloff. “But it says a lot about how we’re able to fight together and how we’re hungry and we’re just not going to give up. That’s not anyone on this team’s characteristics; we’re not going to roll over when we’re down. We’re going to fight, we’re going to scrap, we’re going to claw. Now we just need to build a lead.”

Like the Huskies, the RedHawks (9-10, 5-3 MAC) come into this matchup playing good basketball, winning four out of their last five conference games.

Forward Will Felder has been the centerpiece for the RedHawks on offense this season, leading the team with 14.8 points per game and 7.4 rebounds per game.

“We’re not going to be able to stop him with one guy,” Threloff said. “He’s going to get his shots up; he’s going to take a lot of shots. We just need to make sure his shots are tough and make sure we can rebound out of it and run in transition.”

A big factor in this game will come down to ball control for the Huskies, as the RedHawks have one of the best pressure defenses in the conference. Miami is averaging 8.5 steals per game, and guard Quinten Rollins leads the MAC with 2.4 steals per game.

“Communication is huge,” Threloff said. “We need to talk when there’s a double team coming. We need to be strong with the ball as well because they are going to double team, they are going to trap, they are going to try to take chances, and we just need to exploit their mistakes.”

Offensively, the Huskies will look to continue to play team basketball and spread the ball around.

“We just want to be able to penetrate and kick,” Threloff said. “We have a lot of balanced scoring, and that’s something this team brings to the table. We don’t have anyone over 10 points a game. If everyone can contribute and play our style of play, we should be able to take care of them.”