Tulsa to Close Regular-Season at Memphis on Saturday Night

Saturday, March 9

Memphis, Tenn.

8:30 PM

Tulsa

Memphis

Photo by: Bill Powell

Tulsa to Close Regular-Season at Memphis on Saturday Night

3/7/2019 11:11:00 AM | Men's Basketball

GAME #31: TULSA GOLDEN HURRICANE (18-12, 8-9) vs MEMPHIS TIGERS (18-12, 10-7)
Date/Time:	Saturday • March 9 • 8:30 p.m.
Site:	FedExForum (18,400) • Memphis, Tenn
Coaches:	Tulsa – Frank Haith (Elon '88), 5th year Memphis – Penny Hardaway (Memphis '03), 1st year
TV:	ESPNU (Will Flemming & Sean Harrington)
Radio:	Big Country 99.5 FM (Bruce Howard & J.R. Rollo)
Live Stats:	Live Stats
Series:	Memphis leads, 28-18
Twitter:	@TUMBasketball \| @TulsaHurricane
Instagram:	TulsaMBasketball
Game Notes:	Tulsa \| Memphis

Fast Break Points
• Tulsa is in its 108th season of basketball and fifth season in the American Athletic Conference.
• Tulsa will close the regular-season at 8:30 p.m. on Saturday, March 9 when it will face Memphis in FedExForum.
• TU defeated the Tigers, 95-79, on Jan. 30 at the Reynolds Center.
• Saturday's matchup marks the 47th all-time meeting between Tulsa and Memphis. The Tigers lead the series, 28-18, and own a 15-8 mark against the Hurricane in Memphis.
• DaQuan Jeffries leads the team in scoring at 13.2 ppg and rebounding at 5.6 rpg. Jeffries has led the team in scoring 11 times, including a career-high 25 points in a win over Memphis (Jan. 30). The Edmond native also averages a team-leading 12.9 ppg during conference play.
• Martins Igbanu ranks second in the league with a shooting percentage of .634. Igbanu is shooting 67.2-percent during conference play and he has hit 34 of his last 39 shots (87.2-percent) over the last five games.
• Sterling Taplin scored 11 points against Temple (Feb. 23) to become the 38th player in Tulsa history to register 1,000 career points. Additionally, with 397 career assists, Taplin needs three assists become just the fourth player in program history with at least 1,000 points and 400 assists (Greg Harrington, Shaq Harrison and Ben Uzoh are the others).
• TU has notched 54 league wins since joining The American, which is the fourth-most in the circuit behind only Cincinnati (71), SMU (56) and Houston (56) during that span (2014-present).
• Tulsa was picked to finish ninth in The American Preseason Poll. With eight league wins, TU is guaranteed to finish no worse than eighth in the standings. TU has now finished better than its preseason prediction in all five seasons under head coach Frank Haith.
• With a 10-3 non-conference record, Tulsa had its best start under head coach Frank Haith. The Hurricane registered 10 wins before the start of league play for the first time since 2009-10.

Notes
The Game
• Tulsa will close the regular-season at 8:30 p.m. on Saturday, March 9 when it will face Memphis in FedExForum.
• The game can be seen on ESPNU, while fans in the Tulsa area can tune to Big Country 99.5 FM with Bruce Howard and J.R. Rollo on the call. Live audio from the game also can be found by using the TuneIn app.

Scouting the Tigers
• Memphis was picked to finish fourth in The American as the team returned three starters and six lettermen from last year's squad, which went 21-13 and advanced to The American Championship finals.
• The Tigers have won five of their last seven games and own a 14-2 record at home this season. Those losses have come against No. 5/4 Tennessee and No. 20/19 Cincinnati.
• Memphis is led by Jeremiah Martin, who averages a league-leading 19.7 ppg for the season and 23.4 ppg during conference action. Kyvon Davenport (13.3 ppg) and Tyler Harris (11.0 ppg) also average in double-figures.
• The Tigers boast the league's No. 1 scoring offense at 81.8 ppg for the season and 79.4 ppg during conference play. Memphis also ranks 27th in the nation in steals.

The Series
• Saturday's matchup marks the 47th all-time meeting between Tulsa and Memphis. The Tigers lead the series, 28-18, but TU took a 95-79 victory over Memphis on Jan. 30 in the Reynolds Center.
• Memphis owns a 15-8 mark against Tulsa in Memphis and the last Hurricane victory there came on Feb. 28, 2015.
• Tulsa won the first 11 matchups against Memphis from 1964-71, but the Tigers are 28-7 against the Hurricane since.

Last Meeting
• DaQuan Jeffries scored a career-high 25 points to go along with eight rebounds, while Curran Scott added 20 points to lead Tulsa to a 95-79 win over Memphis on Jan. 30 at the Donald W. Reynolds Center.
• Sterling Taplin (14 pts), Jeriah Horne (13 pts) and Martins Igbanu (10 pts) all scored in double-figures for TU.
• The Tigers got the opening basket, but it was all Tulsa from there as the Hurricane went on an 11-0 run and never looked back. Tulsa scored 22 points in the paint in the first half and led by as much as 22 in the period.
• Memphis went on an 11-1 run early in the second half to trim the deficit to 64-53, but that would be as close as the Tigers got as Tulsa ran away with the 95-79 final.

A Tulsa Win Would ...
• Improve Tulsa's record to 19-12 on the season and even its conference record at 9-9.
• Give Tulsa its first win over the Tigers in Memphis since Feb. 28, 2015, and just its third win on the Tigers' home floor since 1971.
• Secure the No. 7 seed in next week's American Athletic Conference Championship.

Last Time Out
• Curran Scott scored a season-high 23 points and Tulsa shot a season-high 59.3-percent on its way to a 91-78 victory over ECU last Saturday, the final regular-season game at the Reynolds Center this season.
• Scott went 8-of-12 from the floor and hit three 3-pointers, while Martins Igbanu stayed hot with a career-best nine field goals on 10 attempts on his way to 19 points. Jeriah Horne also hit five triples en route to 17 points.
• Tulsa went on an early 14-4 run to take the lead for good and the home squad pushed its lead to 45-36 at halftime with a 12-4 run.
• TU led by double-digits nearly the entire second half and led by as much as 18 with 7:13 to play.

TU To Participate in Coaches vs. Cancer 3-Point Challenge
• Making 3-point shots this basketball season takes on even more meaning for head coach Frank Haith, who serves on the Coaches vs. Cancer Council, and The University of Tulsa men's basketball team. The Golden Hurricane will square off against teams across the nation to fight cancer as part of the American Cancer Society's Coaches vs. Cancer 3-Point Challenge.
• Fans can pledge a donation for each 3-point shot that TU makes over the final 11 games of the regular-season to support American Cancer Society research, education and patient programs at: pledgeit.org/cvc19-tulsa.
• Fans also have the option of making a fixed donation to Coaches vs. Cancer. Haith matched all donations made by fans during the Houston game on Jan. 27 for a total of nearly $5,500 donated to Coaches vs. Cancer.
• So far, Tulsa has hit 70 triples in its 10 games during the 3-point challenge.

Nothing But NET
• Tulsa will enter Saturday's game with a NET ranking of No. 97 (as of March 7).
• All nine of Tulsa's oppnents in the first half of its league schedule are ranked in the top 115, with eight games against opponents in the top 100. In all, Tulsa's total strength of schedule ranks 80th in the nation, which is the second-toughest in The American.
• The Hurricane got two games against Houston (No. 6) and Cincinnati (No. 21) during the early stretch along with matchups against UCF (No. 28), Memphis (No. 50), USF (No. 89), UConn (No. 96) and SMU (No. 112).

Haith In Fifth Season at TU
• Head coach Frank Haith is in his fifth season at Tulsa, where he has compiled a 95-64 record and led the Golden Hurricane to a pair of postseason appearances during his tenure. Overall, he has an on-court record of 300-193 (.609) in his 15th season.
• Haith's 95 wins on the TU bench rank seventh in program history as he passed former Golden Hurricane coaches Bill Self (74), Tubby Smith (74), Francis Schmidt (73), Chet Benefiel (65) and John Phillips (61) on the charts last season.
• Haith's 19.3 wins per season at TU rank fifth among those who coached more than one season for the Hurricane.

Haith in Exclusive Coaching Company
• Head coach Frank Haith is the one of just two active Division I head coaches to take teams in four of the Power 6 conferences to the NCAA Tournament (Houston's Kelvin Sampson is the other). Haith guided Tulsa (The American) to the Big Dance in 2015, Missouri (SEC) in 2013, Missouri (Big 12) in 2012 and Miami (ACC) in 2008.
• In addition, Haith is one of just 24 active coaches that have taken at least three different programs to the NCAA Tournament.
• Haith and the Hurricane will face two other members of that list this season, when the team takes on Bruce Weber and Kansas State (Dec. 8) before two matchups with Sampson and Houston (Jan. 2 and Jan. 27).

Climbing the Charts
• Senior point guard Sterling Taplin is climbing the career assists charts at TU and he entered the program's all-time top five with three assists in the game against Wichita State (Feb. 20).
• Taplin had a career-high 10 assists in TU's win over South Carolina State (Nov. 10), becoming the first TU player to have at least 10 assists in a game since Ben Uzoh had 10 on Feb. 13, 2010.
• Taplin became the 38th player in TU history to reach 1,000 career points when he scored 11 points at Temple (Feb. 23).
• Now with 397 career assists, Taplin needs three assists to become just the fourth player in program history with at least 1,000 points and 400 assists (Greg Harrington, Shaq Harrison and Ben Uzoh are the others).

DaQuan Does It All
• Senior DaQuan Jeffries is averaging a team-leading 13.2 points, 5.6 rebounds, 1.2 blocks and 1.0 steals per game, while shooting 50.6-percent, which ranks seventh in The American.
• Jeffries had one of the best outings of his career on Nov. 27 against UT Arlington, when he went 10-of-11 from the floor to finish with 24 points. He had the best shooting percentage for a TU player who made at least 10 field goals since Charlie Davis went 11-of-12 (.916) against SMU on Jan. 19, 2002.
• In addition, Jeffries ranks 15th on the program's career blocks list with 71 swats. He has 35 blocks this season, including a season-high three rejections against Little Rock, UCF, Memphis and Wichita State.
• Jeffries was named the American Athletic Conference Player of the Week on Dec. 10 after helping TU to wins over Oklahoma State (Dec. 5) and then-No. 16/15 Kansas State (Dec. 8).

Efficient Igbanu
• Junior forward Martins Igbanu has proven to be one of the most efficient players in The American this year, ranking second only to UCF's Tacko Fall in field goal percentage at 63.4-percent this season.
• He has been even better in conference play, connecting at a 67.2-percent clip, and he has made 34 of his last 39 shots (87.2-percent) over the previous five games.
• That efficiency has helped him to a team-leading 22 double-digit scoring performances this season, including 10+ points in 10 of his last 11 games.

Around the Horne
• Redshirt sophomore Jeriah Horne has made a big impact off the bench in his first season at TU after transferring from Nebraska. The Overland Park, Kan., native is averaging 9.9 ppg, which ranks third on the team, and made the first start of his career at Temple (Feb. 23).
• He has been even better in conference play, where he is averaging 11.5 ppg (3rd on the team). Horne has two 20-point outings in conference action, including a career-high 27 points against UConn (Jan. 16) along with the first double-double of his career, which was a 20-point, 12-rebound effort at Tulane (Feb. 14).
• Horne has 14 double-figure scoring games this season, including 10 such games during conference play, and he leads the team with 44 3-pointers made.

Trending
• Darien Jackson is averaging 7.1 ppg over his last eight games, including three double-digit performances. He has scored 87 points over his last 14 games after totaling 20 points in his first 28 contests at TU.
• During conference play, Tulsa has held opponents to 41.4-percent shooting, which ranks third in the league behind Houston and UCF. Only one conference opponent has shot 50-percent or better against TU (Temple, Feb. 23).
• Martins Igbanu ranks second in the league with a shooting percentage of .621, which ranks only behind UCF's Tacko Fall. Igbanu is shooting 67.2-percent during conference play and he has hit 34 of his last 39 shots (87.2-percent) over the last five games.
• Tulsa has featured a balanced offensive attack as the team has had at least four double-figure scorers in seven of the last 11 games, including six double-figure scorers in the win at ECU (Feb. 17).

Tulsa's Success in The American
• Since joining the American Athletic Conference prior to the 2014-15 season, the Golden Hurricane has posted 54 league wins, which is the fourth-most in the circuit during that time.
• Only Cincinnati (71), SMU (56) and Houston (56) have earned more victories than Tulsa's 54.
• TU has finished better than its preseason prediction in each of Haith's five seasons. Tulsa is the first program in The American history to finish better than its preseason prediction in five consecutive seasons.
• The Golden Hurricane was picked to finish ninth this season and will finish no worse than eighth in the circuit.

Free Fallin'
• The Hurricane rank second in the league in free throw attempts (722) and and third in free throws made (499). Those marks rank 10th and 20th in the nation, respectively.
• The squad is averaging 24.1 attempts per game with a season high of 40 in the win over California Baptist (Nov. 16). TU has shot more than 20 free throws in a game 21 times this season. The Hurricane has shot more than 30 free throws in a game eight times.
• Martins Igbanu leads the team at 5.4 free-throw attempts per game, while Jeriah Horne (.811/43-of-53) leads the team in free-throw percentage.

Home Cookin'
• After hosting the first TU men's basketball game on Dec. 29, 1998, the Golden Hurricane is in its 21st season in the Donald W. Reynolds Center this year.
• Tulsa has posted an overall record of 253-75 (.771) in its 20+ seasons, including a 14-3 mark this season. Tulsa's 14 home wins this season are the most for the team since the 2009-10 season, when it claimed 16 home wins.
• The building has seen 42 sellouts and 1,926,013 fans have witnessed Tulsa basketball at the Reynolds Center.

Earning Degrees
• Frank Haith has made achievement in the classroom as much of a priority as success on the basketball court over his nearly 15 years as a head coach. During head coaching tenures at Miami, Missouri and Tulsa, 54 of the 58 (93.1-percent) seniors that have come through his programs have earned a degree.
• Since arriving at Tulsa, 14 of the program's 15 seniors (93.3-percent) have graduated, including Corey Haith, Corey Henderson Jr., Jaleel Wheeler and Junior Etou from last year's team.
• Additionally, Tulsa has had at least two student-athletes recognized on the American Athletic Conference All-Academic Team in each of Haith's four seasons. Last year, both Alex Foree and Curran Scott made the team, which honors student-athletes with at least a 3.0 GPA.

Look Who's Back
• Tulsa returns eight letterwinners, including three starters, from last year's team, which went 19-12 and finished fourth in The American with a 12-6 league mark.
• Returning starters include senior point guard Sterling Taplin (30 starts), junior forward Martins Igbanu (23) and junior guard Lawson Korita (17).
• Other returners include senior guard/forward DaQuan Jeffries, senior forward Alex Foree, junior guard Curran Scott and sophomore guards Elijah Joiner and Darien Jackson.
• In all, Tulsa returns 56.3-percent of its scoring, 56.7-percent of its minutes, 48.9-percent of its rebounding, 69.5-percent of its assists and 59.7-percent of its steals.

In Memory of Bob Patterson
• Tulsa will wear a "30" patch on its home uniforms this season to honor Bob Patterson (1951-55), who passed away in November. Patterson was Tulsa's first All-American and was the first TU player to be selected in the NBA Draft.
• A member of the TU Athletic Hall of Fame, Patterson still owns Tulsa single-season records for rebounds (370; 1954-55), free throws made (229; 1954-55) and free throws attempted (297; 1954-55).
• Patterson was the Missouri Valley Conference Player of the Year as a senior and led the Hurricane to an MVC title and its first NCAA Tournament appearance. He also was named to the NCAA Western Regional Team that season.

Roster Experience
• Despite having seven newcomers on the roster for 2018-19, Tulsa features 10 players with Division I experience.
• Those 10 players have totaled 17 years of Division I experience, led by three years from senior Sterling Taplin.
• Even with the influx of newcomers, Tulsa is one of just seven Division I programs without a scholarship freshman on the roster. TU's only freshman is walk-on George Christopolous, who is redshirting this season.
• Counting walk-ons, TU is one of just seven Division I programs to have one or fewer total freshmen on its roster.

New Faces
• Along with the eight returning letterwinners, Tulsa has seven newcomers in addition to Jeriah Horne, who sat out the 2017-18 season after transferring from Nebraska.
• The newcomers eligible to make their debut for the Hurricane this season are Chris Barnes, Peter Hewitt, Jeriah Horne, Simon Falokun and walk-on Lindsay Deline Jr. Reggie Jones will sit out the 2018-19 campaign after transferring from Western Michigan and walk-on George Christopoulos will redshirt, as well.
• Of the five eligible to make their debut for TU, two student-athletes have Division I experience (Chris Barnes/UTEP and Jeriah Horne/Nebraska), while Peter Hewitt redshirted at UC Davis in 2016-17.
• TU newcomers have totaled 438 points (14.6 ppg) so far this season, led by 297 points (9.9 ppg) from Jeriah Horne.

Exhibition Excellence
• Tulsa improved to 67-2 all-time in exhibition games with a 95-60 win over Division II Northeastern State on Nov. 2 in the Reynolds Center. It also marked the 38th straight exhibition victory for the Golden Hurricane.
• Curran Scott scored 16 points off the bench to lead a balanced scoring effort that saw nine Tulsa players tally at least eight points.
• Newcomer Simon Falokun was the only other player in double-figures with 14 points on 4-of-4 shooting and a 6-for-6 effort from the free-throw line. Falokun also had six rebounds and a pair of blocks.

Tulsa Signs Isaiah Hill to NLI
• Isaiah Hill, a 6-foot point guard from Bakersfield, Calif. (Liberty HS), signed a National Letter of Intent on Nov. 14, the first day of the early signing period, to join The University of Tulsa men's basketball program for the 2019-20 season.
• Hill is the highest-rated high school recruit in TU history, according to 247sports.com, which lists Hill as a three-star prospect and the No. 25 point guard recruit in the nation.
• He averaged 22 points, eight rebounds and six assists per game as a junior en route to first-team All-Area honors from the Bakersfield Californian.

Up Next
• Tulsa will open play at the 2019 Air Force Reserve American Athletic Conference Men's Basketball Championship, which will be held at the FedExForum in Memphis, Tenn., on March 14.

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