ROCK HILL, SC—Winners of three of its last four games, Winthrop begins a two-game home stand when it hosts Charleston Southern, Monday night at 8 p.m. at the Winthrop Coliseum. The game will be aired on the American Sports Network (ASN).
The game will only be available in the Rock Hill area on the AltitudeTV on DIRECTV live and can be seen in Charlotte on the Time Warner Cable Sports Channel. If you can't watch the game you can listen to Dave Friedman call the action on WRHI AM 1340/FM 94.3 at 8 p.m. with the pregame starting at 7:30 p.m. live on WRHI.com.
Winthrop has played six of its last eight games on the road and it just passed the midway point in the Big South Conference slate in the loss on Saturday at Radford. The Eagles are now 11-10 overall and 6-4 in the Big South as it matches the same overall record through 21 games in 2013-14. This will be the team's second of three games in a five-day span that will come to a close on Wednesday at home against Liberty.
This will mark the 63
rd meeting all-time between Winthrop and Charleston Southern (13-8, 7-3 BSC) as the Eagles have won 12 straight at the Winthrop Coliseum and lead the all-time series 37-25 overall and 31-24 in regular season Big South games only.
Winthrop has played six of its first 10 games in the Big South on the road, posting a 4-2 record following Saturday's loss at Radford. In its first four home conference games, the Eagles are 2-2 despite averaging 79.2 points. While the Eagles have led at the half in all six road contests in the league, they have yet to lead at the break in the four home games.
This game will feature the second and third highest scoring teams in Big South games only as Charleston Southern averages 75.6 and the Eagles average 73.4. Charleston Southern is averaging a league-best 10 threes per game in league play while the Eagles are 5
th at 7.6.
There will also be two of the league's top four scorers in Winthrop's
Keon Moore and Saah Nimley of Charleston Southern. Moore is fourth in the league in scoring at 18.2 ppg and Nimely leads the league at 20.0. Nimely has upped his average to 25.6 ppg in league games (1
st) and Moore is second in league games only at 19.8.
Moore is one of three Eagles averaging double-figures as sophomore
Keon Johnson is second on the team at 11.4 and senior
Andre Smith is averaging 10.7 per game. The trio has combined for 136 of Winthrop's 163 three-pointers on the year. Moore is coming off his second consecutive 22-point game and now hit the 20-point plateau nine times this season. In two games against the Bucs in 2013-14, Moore averaged a team-best 16.5 points while shooting 50 percent from the field and 58 percent from three. Smith averaged 15.5 points while shooting 48 percent and 50 percent from three.
Smith is looking to become the 21
st player in Winthrop history to reach 1,000 career points as he needs to average 7.2 points per game over the next nine games to reach that mark or 8.2 to reach 1,000 before the end of the regular season. He's also closing in on becoming the fifth player in school history to reach 200 career three-pointers as he has 191.
The combination of Nimley, Will Saunders and Arlon Harper have knocked down 163 of the team's 192 threes. No other trio in the league has combined for that many with Moore, Smith and Johnson being the closest.
Saunders and Harper are both tied for second on the team in scoring at 12.8. Saunders has increased his averaged to 14.2 in league play and Harper is at 14.6.
The Bucs are coming off a 74-62 road win over Liberty as they have won two straight on the road in league play and six of their last seven games. On the year they are 3-6 on the road and averaging 61.8 points per game and allowing 70.
