A 2-0 start to conference play is great, but the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff still has a lot to prove this season.
The UAPB men’s basketball team will try to remain unbeaten in league play this weekend as it leaves home for the first time in a month to face Texas Southern at 4 p.m. Saturday and Prairie View A&M at 6 p.m. Monday in the greater Houston area.
Coach Solomon Bozeman said the Golden Lions know they must take this season one game at a time.
“I think every time you step on the floor, man, you got a chance to prove yourselves,” Bozeman said. “That’s all this team wants to do. We want to continue to build and focus on ourselves, but at the same time, Pine Bluff basketball has been at the bottom for so long. I think this group really wants to change that, and that’s what our focus is right now.”
UAPB (5-10, 2-0 SWAC) is off to its best start to conference play in five years after defeating Alabama State, the reigning SWAC champions, and Alabama A&M this past weekend. Those wins saw the Golden Lions jump from 303 to 281 in the NCAA’s NET rankings, making UAPB the third-highest ranked team in the conference.
Independent reporting for Pine Bluff & Jefferson County since 1879.
Two of the SWAC’s three weekly honors went to Golden Lions after those wins. Senior guard Quion Williams was named Newcomer of the Week after shooting 40 percent from the field and grabbing 13 total rebounds with 13 assists.
Senior guard Alex Mirhosseini was named Impact Player of the Week after making 8 of 16 shots from 3-point range in those two games. He and Williams each averaged 18.5 points against the Alabama schools.
Mirhosseini said it felt good to be honored after how nonconference play went for him.
“I was really struggling shooting,” Mirhosseini said. “I kind of lost confidence in myself. The past two games, I really shot the ball well, so that really did help me a lot. … (The team) never stopped believing in me. If I went 0 for 10, 2 for 10, it never mattered. They always had the same faith in me.”
Bozeman said UAPB expects to get senior forward Kyle Brown back this weekend. Brown missed the past two games after suffering a leg injury against Champion Christian on Dec. 17. True freshman guard Jai’Chaunn Hayes, who was averaging 6.1 points per game in 10 appearances, will not return this season.
Texas Southern (2-11, 0-2) returns home to face UAPB after dropping its first conference games of the season on the road at Southern, 84-73, and Grambling State, 84-67. The Tigers are one of two remaining teams in the SWAC without a Division I victory, the other being Mississippi Valley State.
Senior forward Troy Hupstead leads the Tigers with 14.8 points per game. He is the SWAC’s top rebounder with 8.4 per game.
Prairie View A&M (6-9, 1-1) is coming off an 89-85 road win at Southern after dropping its SWAC opener to Grambling. The Panthers enter this week ranked 266 in the NET, making them and Grambling the only teams ranked higher than UAPB.
So far this season, the Panthers have the highest-scoring offense and the third-ranked scoring defense in the conference. Their 77% shooting at the free throw line is second only to UAPB, and they boast the SWAC’s best turnover margin, 4.8. UAPB, of note, leads the league with an assist-to-turnover ratio of 1.17.
Graduate student guard Tai’Reon Joseph is the SWAC’s leading scorer with 23 points per game. His 2.7 made 3-pointers per game also leads the conference. Joseph is the reigning SWAC player of the week after scoring 32 points with five rebounds in the win at Southern.
Bozeman said Joseph and the Panthers have been playing good basketball all season.
“Even in nonconference, man, when I followed their games, they played really well,” Bozeman said. “So, we’re just going to have to be disciplined on that defensive end and then make sure we take care of the basketball on the offensive end and continue to play the right way.”
The Panthers will be a tough opponent, but recent history favors UAPB. The Golden Lions have won two of their past three games against Prairie View, including last year’s 75-64 win at the “Baby Dome.” The Panthers are 4-0 in that building so far this season, though they have yet to host a Division I opponent. They’ll host MVSU on Saturday ahead of Monday’s game.