Southern Indiana Preview (MBB)

BG's MBB team journeys to Evansville, IN Saturday to play the Screaming Eagles of Southern Indiana.

As a review from last year, Southern Indiana was a highly-competitive DII program and moved up to D1 last season.  They were not bad, going 16-17 and 9-9 in the OVC and playing in one of the minor post-season tournaments. And they beat BG at the Stroh.

This year is a different story. They lost their top six scorers from last year.  They were picked 9th in the OVC.  Blue Ribbon had them 5th.   According to kenpom, they are #332 in experience.

They are 0-6 against D1 teams with a kenpom of 332. They lost at home to Chicago State, who BG beat easily, and lost @Bucknell (331) and @ LaSalle (200).  Along with that, @St. Louis, @Duke and @MSU.

They are averaging .96 points per possession, which is one of the 30 worst in the country. The defense is not good either, at 1.08 points per possession, but ranked in the 250s.

Offensively, they are bad at everything.  EFG (ranked 269), turnovers (289), offensive rebounding (299) and FT Rate (359). They are below average on 3FGs and poor on 2FGs. They are #307 in FT%. 

On defense, they are actually a little above average defending the shot, including #122 against 2FG. They are also excellent on the defensive boards.  They don't force turnovers and they give up a lot of FTs. (This smells like a packed in defense). 

They have two double figure scorers.

Jesse Hernandez scores 12.5 per game. He shoots 45% and 26%.  He actually started at Kent before moving to USI the year before last.

AJ Smith scores 12.1 PPG on 50% and 33% shooting.  He also leads the team with 9.3 RPG. He's 6'6" and started at USI.

Jack Campion, PG, has 40 assists.  He also started at USI. 

BG is a 5.5 point favorite, which laying the points seems like the move to me.