Marshall University Athletics
Thundering Herd Men's Basketball Heads To Tulane Saturday
2/19/2010 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Feb. 19, 2010
HUNTINGTON, W.Va.--Marshall University (19-7, 6-4 C-USA) travels to Tulane (7-18, 2-10 C-USA) for Conference USA play Feb. 20 in New Orleans. Marshall and Tulane are playing for the 10th time with the series tied at 5-5. The Thundering Herd defeated the Green Wave 89-79 Jan. 16 in Huntington.
The game is scheduled to be televised in the Huntington/Charleston market on WOWK-TV (Ch.13) and by Cox Sports Television (CST). CST is available to over 1,500,000 viewers in Texas, Arkansas, Louisiana, and North/Central Florida and is available on satellite on Galaxy 23, transponder 1.
Tulane is led by Kris Richard who is scoring 12.7 points per game. Richard is the Green Wave leader in made field goals (105), field goal attempts (257), made three-pointer (38), three-point field goal attempts (116), and steals. He is tied for the team lead in assists with Kevin Sims (50). Sims, who has been slowed by injury this season, is the second leading Tulane scorer (12.1 ppg). The Green Wave have dropped eight of their last nine games entering this weekend's action.
Hassan Whiteside (Fr., Gastonia, N.C.) poured in a team-high 17 points and Tyler Wilkerson (Sr., Lexington, Ky.) tallied his 16th career double-double to lead Marshall past Tulsa, 64-58 Feb. 17 at the Cam Henderson Center.
Whiteside made 5-of-11 shots from the field, added nine rebounds and four blocked shots to his stat line. Wilkerson tallied 10 points and 10 rebounds, while Chris Lutz (R-Sr., Bedford, N.H.) (15) and Damier Pitts (So., Charlotte, N.C.) (13) each scored in double figures
MU found itself trailing 7-6 at the 16:30 mark in the first half prior to Whiteside sparking an 11-2 run. Whiteside converted a 3-point play and later Pitts and Darryl Merthie (Sr., Sanford, Fla.) would sink consecutive three-pointers to put the Herd up 17-9 with 12:50 left. Later on in the half, Whiteside jump started a 6-2 spurt for the Herd when he rejected a Tulsa shot and on the ensuing fast break dunked an alley-oop pass from Pitts to ignite the 5,321 MU fans and own a 21-15 cushion.
The Golden Hurricane closed out the opening stanza on a 6-0 run to shrink the MU lead to 30-25 at intermission. Ozuh was the lone player in double figures heading into the locker with 10 points. Tulsa took its first lead of the game since the early minutes of the opening half, when Steven Idlet hit the back end of a pair of free throws, to hold a 42-41 advantage with 12:32 remaining. Uzoh continued to drive to the basket and made three-straight shots for the Golden Hurricane to extend its lead to 50-45 and force the Herd into a timeout with 8:06 left.
Pitts scooped a layup high off the glass just beyond the outstretched reach of Jordan to help the Herd retake the lead. After a layup from Uzoh, Lutz buried a trey from the wing and Whiteside made two shots at the charity stripe to give the Herd a four-point advantage, 58-54, with 2:08 left. The Herd sank 8-of-10 free throws in the final 51.8 seconds to preserve the 64-58 victory.
Whiteside (135) is eight blocks away from the overall Conference USA record for most blocks in a season (Jerome Jordan-Tulsa, 143, 2007-08).
