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FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. – The Nova Southeastern men’s basketball team (9-11, 4-7 SSC) will look to even out the season series against Florida Tech (15-5, 7-4 SSC) Wednesday in Melbourne, Fla. at 7:30 p.m. The game will broadcast live on 640 Sports.
The Sharks will look to snap their worst skid of the season after losing their fourth straight game to the Florida Southern Mocs, 94-85, on the road Saturday. The Sharks allowed the home team to shoot over 50 percent from the floor in both halves and could not overcome their 18 turnovers. Although the main goal remains to prepare for the Sunshine State Conference tournament, the Sharks only have a handful of games remaining to move themselves up the SSC standings.
“With five league games remaining, including three road games beginning Wednesday at Florida Tech, we obviously have a lot of work to do if we hope to move up the ladder,” said head coach
Gary Tuell. “Nothing is easy in this league this year, and our players understand that. I don’t know that any team has been more competitive, night in and night out, than our team. But being close won’t move you up in the standings. At some point you have to win and to do that you have to finish games on the defensive end. We didn’t do that at Florida Southern Saturday. We were in position, down two with under four to play, but we didn’t give a winning effort on the defensive end.”
The Sharks will have to rebound against a Panther team that is gunning for the league title. Florida Tech has put forth one of the top offenses in the SSC this season, ranking second in points per game (78.3) and first in scoring margin (+8.2). They electric offense even earned the team a spot in Sportcenter’s Top-10 Plays earlier in the season. They are coming off a loss to Saint Leo Saturday, 73-63, and will look to get back in the win column. This is nothing new for the Sharks, as the Panthers will be the seventh of the last eight SSC opponents to play the Sharks after coming off a loss.
“Everyone knows Florida Tech has the best offensive balance in the league,” Tuell said. “They can score from all five positions, and certainly their stats prove the point with five guys averaging in double figures. But I’ve been as impressed with their improvement on defense as much as anything. It’s a nightmare to game plan against them and try to decide what, if anything, you can take away from them.
“But it’s their defense that has put them in a dogfight for first place all year. Their man defense is excellent and when they do go to their different zones they add another dimension to their game. We struggled against the zone traps last time we played, but we’ve had time to prepare for that and we should handle it better this time around. I’m more concerned with their man defense and how well they defend inside. Billy Mims has done another good coaching job with his team, utilizing all his options.”
NSU will look to finish the regular season 1-1 against Florida Tech as the Panthers defeated the Sharks, 88-85, back on Jan. 4.
Lukas Roesch (Jr., Sugar Grove, Ohio) scored 21 points for the second time in three games to lead the contest in points scored on 8-for-10 shooting.
Teddy Tassy (Sr., Port-au-Prince, Haiti) followed behind him with 19 points on 6-for-13 shooting.
“It comes down to effort and hard work,” stated Tuell. “If we’re going to be competitive at [Florida] Tech we’ll have to take care of the ball, be aggressive offensively because you have to score with them to have a chance and in the end our guys will have to accept the challenge defensively. We have preached all year that every player has to ‘guard his yard.’ That’s certainly the case this week because they will test both your individual and team defense as much as anyone.
“With
Justin Jeangerard (Fr., Weaverville, Calif.) nursing an injury that will keep him out of Wednesday’s game, we’ll have to try some different combinations.
Jacob Reed (So., Perth, Australia) finally came out of his shell and gave us some good minutes at Florida Southern. Hopefully he can use that experience to give us another positive effort at Tech. I thought
Xavier Allen (Fr., Atlanta, Ga.) did a good job for us when he was in there and we’ll look to give him another opportunity to get some experience at Tech. But we’ll need everybody’s best effort. Tech is fighting for first place and they’re home, where they have the most raucous crowds of any team in our league. It’s going to be fun.”
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HERE. Live stats will also be available
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www.Twitter.com/NSU_MBasketball.
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