The men’s basketball team will be on the road against Central Arkansas Thursday night after a two-game home stand, where it was a perfect 2-0.
This will be the second game played between the two teams. In the first meeting, Central Arkansas beat the Wildcats in Moody 81-76 to hand them a third conference loss in a row.
However, the Wildcats are coming off of two impressive wins beating two first place teams in New Orleans and Sam Houston in back-to-back games.
While the team has proved its strength of playing in Moody by going 8-3 in home games, it has struggled when playing on the road posting a 2-9 record in away games this season.
Sophomore point guard Jaylen Franklin, who is averaging 10.7 points per game and leading his team in assists per game with four, talked about the team’s impressive wins and what getting this road victory will mean.
“The two wins meant a lot to us. Beating the number one teams this past week gave us a lot of confidence,” Franklin said. “Getting this win on the road will give us even more confidence because they beat us at home when we played them.”
The Wildcats moved up to 11th in the conference after beating Sam Houston and have a record of 4-7 in Southland play while Central Arkansas is in ninth in the conference with a 5-6 record.
Although Central Arkansas’ record might not seem to impressive, the men will face off against a talented player in Jordan Howard, who is tied for second in the conference in scoring averaging 19.5 points a game.
ACU will also have its hands full in the post, facing two tough rebounding big men in Mathieu Kamba, averaging seven rebounds a game, and Derreck Brooks, averaging 6.9.
Sophomore guard Jaren Lewis said the team will be focusing ball security against Central Arkansas.
“We are really focusing on taking care of the ball against Central Arkansas and being able to slow down their offense.” Lewis said.
The game is scheduled to tip off at 7 P.M. and can be heard on 98.1 FM. Since moving to Div. 1, ACU has lost to UCA just once, with two one-point decisions in its favor.
