ROCK HILL, SC—Basketball season is upon us and it's time to "Rock The Hill" as the Winthrop men's basketball team opens the season on Saturday, Nov. 15 at 4 p.m. against Pfeiffer College as part of Homecoming Week at Winthrop.
The Eagles are coming off a 20-13 record and a Big South Conference Championship Game appearance as they look to fly higher this season with the return of four starters that includes the scoring trio of senior's
Keon Moore and
Andre Smith and sophomore
Keon Johnson.
Winthrop averaged 74 points per game last season, the most since 2006-07 when the team averaged 74.9. The trio of Moore, Smith and Johnson were some of the more prolific scorers in the Big South and combined to make 199 threes as the team fell four triples shy of the school record.
This season the Eagles will look to rely on the experience of the backcourt that has become stronger in the offseason with the return of junior guard
Derrick Henry, who led the team in scoring during head coach
Pat Kelsey's first season at the helm.
Moore led the team in scoring last year with 14.0 points per game and shot 39 percent from three while knocking down 64 on the year. Johnson also knocked down 64 threes on the year and averaged 12.3 points. Both Moore and Johnson were among the best free throw shooters in the league as Moore shot 82 percent and Johnson was second in the league at 85 percent. Smith made the most threes on the team at 71 while averaging 10.1 points per game.
While the team nearly broke the school record for threes in a season, the Eagles shot the ball well behind the arc at 40 percent and shot 45 percent from the floor as a team. Minus the three-pointers, Winthrop shot 48 percent from the field.
Kelsey praised his 2013-14 squad for playing so unselfishly on the offensive end of the floor and in a true Winthrop fashion, a "toughness" on the defensive end and looks for the same this year.
Every team in the country has high hopes of staying healthy during a season and especially start the season as healthy as possible but the Eagles have endured some injury issues that will make them a little thin in the front court to start off the 2014-15 campaign. Returning forward
James Bourne had season-ending surgery and forward
Larry Brown is out for an undetermined amount of time recovering from injury. Bourne and Brown are both seniors that have played significant roles in their three-year careers and combined to start 100 games. Redshirt freshman
Duby Okeke is also battling injuries but could play in the game.
Freshmen
Xavier Cooks and
Joseph Lopez have both battled mononucleosis as Cooks is still in recovery but should return soon while Lopez has been back to practice a little over a week after missing 2-3 weeks. Both were highly recruited by Kelsey and expected to contribute their first year.
Winthrop is 23-14 in season openers and 29-6 when opening the season at home. This will mark the fifth meeting all-time with Pfeiffer as the Eagles lead the series 3-1. The two teams last met on Jan. 23, 1989 at the Winthrop Coliseum in a 77-61 win for the Eagles.
Pfeiffer is coming off a 6-21 year in which it averaged 79 points per game and allowed 88.1. Heading into this season you can't read into that too much into those numbers as just four players return from last year's team. However, three of the team's top four scorers from last year return highlighted by sophomore Mike Smith. The 5-9 guard averaged 21.5 points, 3.4 rebounds and 1.96 steals per game.
Junior guard A.J. Clark returns after scoring 16.5 points and dishing out 4.0 assists per game. Also returning is 6-11 center, Silvere Alluko that averaged 7.0 rebounds, 5.2 rebounds and 3.2 blocks per game as a sophomore.
