COVERAGE LINKS | GAME NOTES

ARKADELPHIA, Ark. - Henderson State opens its final road stint of the 2023-24 regular season with its next four games away from the Duke Wells Center, beginning Saturday in Monticello, Arkansas, as the Reddies take on the Boll Weevils in a 3 p.m. tip-off from Steelman Fieldhouse.

REDDIES REPORT (7-15, 6-11 GAC)
Henderson St. dropped its penultimate home game of the regular season Thursday against Ouachita Baptist in overtime, 92-87. It was the first men's basketball Battle of the Ravine game to go to overtime since the 2011-12 season. Thursday's loss marked the first time HSU had lost both regular season contests against the Tigers since the 2015-16 campaign.

The Reddies held a 13-point lead at the 12 minute mark of the second half before missed free-throws allowed OUA to fight its way back. This season, HSU has held a double-digit lead at some point in seven of its 11 conference losses this season, including four showings where it claimed a second-half double-digit advantage, including Thursday's Battle of the Ravine.

Henderson is still mathematically alive in the race for the GAC Tournament in three weeks. With five games remaining, HSU is just one game back of eighth place and two games back of fourth in the congested league standings. In order to reach the conference postseason for the sixth straight year, the Reddies will need to do at least a couple somethings it has only done once this season: win away from the Duke Wells Center. The red-and-gray are 1-10 in road and neutral site games for the 2023-24 campaign.

It has been over two months since the season's first meeting between Henderson State and Arkansas-Monticello. The Reddies, in what was only their second conference game at that point, posted their largest margin of victory over the Boll Weevils in GAC history, 90-59. The HSU defense held UAM to 17.6 percent (3-of-17) shooting from beyond the arc while the red-and-gray offense made 36 field-goals compared to just 21 for Monticello. Henderson also got a big boost on the boards (50-35) as well as points-off-turnovers (23-2).

Individually, Clarence King (24) and Zyon Patterson (22) combined for 48 points, with Tomislav Miholjcic adding 13 points and eight rebounds. Defensively, the Reddies allowed UAM to produce just two double-digit scorers as 59 points is the fewest points HSU has allowed to any team this season. Henderson has held Arkansas-Monticello below 62 points in four of the last five meetings, claiming victory in each instance.    

SCOUTING ARKANSAS-MONTICELLO (10-12, 8-9 GAC)
After losing to Henderson State and starting out GAC play 0-2, Arkansas-Monticello won six of its next nine conference games. The Boll Weevils were in the midst of a three-game losing streak before pulling out a two-point victory in Magnolia against Southern Arkansas, 67-65. Trailing by six with 4:06 left in regulation, UAM scored nine of the game's final 10 points to claim the victory.

Monticello is currently tied for fourth in the conference standings with an 8-9 record. After hosting Henderson, it will be play three straight road games at Southern Nazarene, Oklahoma Baptist and Harding, all of which are either tied or one game back of the Weevils, before closing the regular season at home versus Ouachita Baptist. Arkansas-Monticello is 7-5 at home and 3-5 in true road games this season.

The Boll Weevils are only managing 64.0 points per game, which is twelfth in the GAC, but are holding their opponents to a league-second best 67.0 points per game. When UAM is scoring, a large part of it is coming from guards Isaac Jackson (20.8 ppg) and Zane Nelson (19.0 ppg), who are two of the three leading scorers in the conference. In the first go-around, Jackson handed HSU 23 points while Nelson was held to just one point.