Raiders continue homestand against Southern Thursday night

The Wright State men's basketball team continues its four-game homestand on Thursday night when the Raiders welcome Southern to the Nutter Center for a 7 p.m. tipoff. The Raiders enter the matchup 7-3 overall, while Southern is 3-6. The Jaguars are the first of two consecutive members of the Southwestern Athletic Conference (SWAC) that will visit the Nutter Center, with Mississippi Valley State coming to town on Dec. 17.

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Wright State is coming off of a Saturday afternoon 84-77 overtime loss to visiting Indiana State. Trey Calvin tied the game at 73-all with a layup with 33 seconds remaining in regulation for the Raiders before Indiana State let the clock wind down under 10 seconds and a jumper was off the mark followed by a pair of missed tip-in opportunities at the horn, sending the game to overtime. After trading scores in the extra period, Indiana State took the lead for good on a Cooper Neese three pointer with 2:41 remaining. Wright State came up empty the rest of the way, missing five shot attempts and committing a pair of turnovers to end the afternoon.

SOUTHERN WIN(D)S
Southern enters Thursday's matchup with a 3-6 record overall and on a two-game losing streak. The Jaguars opened the year with an 87-70 home win over Loyola (New Orleans), an NAIA school, and also feature a 121-55 home win over Ecclesia, a NCCAA program. Southern's most recent victory came on Nov. 26 when it defeated Horizon League foe IUPUI, 83-77 in Omaha, Nebraska.

Five of the Jaguars' six losses have come by 15 or more points, but Southern put a scare into Nebraska on Nov. 22, taking the Huskers to overtime before falling 93-86. Southern is in the middle of a nearly week and a half trip north, first taking on Akron last Saturday (L, 57-72) before visiting the Raiders for Thursday's matchup and then ending the trip in Indianapolis with a meeting against Butler on Saturday afternoon.

SIMPLY SOUTHERN
Damiree Burns (9.1), Micah Bradford (9.0) and Amel Kuljuhovic (9.0) lead the Jaguars in scoring, while Darius Williams' 7.2 rebounds/game paces Southern on the glass.

Southern head coach Sean Woods is in his second season with the Jaguars. Woods played collegiately at Kentucky, falling in the Elite Eight of the 1992 NCAA tournament on Christian Laettner's famous turnaround jumper at the buzzer that gave Duke the win and ended Woods' collegiate career. Woods' first head coaching job came at Mississippi Valley State, and in his last season there in 2012, the Delta Devils won the SWAC regular season and conference tournament before losing in the First Four round. Woods was chosen as the 2012 winner of the Ben Jobe Award, given annually to the most outstanding minority men's college basketball head coach in NCAA Division I competition. He has also been the head coach at Morehead State in his career prior to joining the Jaguars.

BASILE STEPPING UP
Since being inserted in the starting lineup on Nov. 27, freshman forward Grant Basile has scored in double figures in all three contests and is averaging 13.0 points/game and 9.7 rebounds/game over that stretch.

Basile turned in a pair of double-digit scoring games last week, including a double-double in the Raiders' 76-74 win over Western Kentucky Dec. 3. Basile's 12-point, 10 rebound game against the Hilltoppers was his second consecutive and second career double-double, while he then added a 11-point, seven rebound effort on Dec. 7 against Indiana State. In his first career start on Nov. 27 against Miami (OH), he tallied his first career double-double with 17 points and 12 rebounds – recording 11 points and grabbing eight rebounds in the second half

MID-MAJOR POLL
Wright State sits at No. 17 in the latest CollegeInsider.com Mid-Major Top 25 poll, released on Dec. 9. The Raiders have been in the rankings all season long, climbing as high as No. 10 (Nov. 11 poll date) after opening at No. 13 in the preseason listing. For the first time this season, the Horizon League has two teams in the poll, as Northern Kentucky is tabbed at No. 24.

Raiders continue homestand against Southern Thursday night

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Players Mentioned

Grant Basile

Trey Calvin

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