USC Upstate Preview with Engles, Shustov and Izevbuwa (Video)


NJIT Men's Basketball Gameday Center
 

Game 30	NJIT (17-12; 8-5 A-Sun) at USC Upstate (9-21; 3-10 A-Sun)
Date/Time	Thursday, February 25, 2016/ 7 pm
Location/Venue	Spartanburg, SC/ GB Hodge Center (837)
Live Coverage	ESPN3 streaming telecast (WatchESPN app; www.watchespn.com)  Live audio: www.njithighlanders.com; Matt Provence, pbp
Live Stats	In-game statistics (free)
Social Media	@njithighlanders
All-Time Series	USC Upstate leads, 1-0 (Upstate, 80-78, at NJIT, January 9, 2016)
Game Notes	NJIT Game Notes / USC Upstate notes

 
The game will be shown live on ESPN3.
  
A simple way to find ESPN3 is on NJIT's official athletics website, www.njithighlanders.com. Near the middle of the home page NJIT TV section, click Upcoming Events for a list of scheduled NJIT contests. After finding the event, click the camera icon to the right of the event listing. That brings you to an ESPN3 portal where you can access the desired program.
 
For more details on how to watch NJIT on ESPN3, go to the section at the bottom of this page.
 
Matt Provence, voice of the Highlanders, will have the audio call of the game live and free of charge on the Highlander Sports Network, which can be found on www.njithighlanders.com (no charge). Access the audio feed by clicking the speaker icon on the NJIT TV Upcoming Events listing for the Jacksonville game.  

Atlantic Sun Conference Game: NJIT at USC Upstate (Thursday, 7 pm)
The eight Atlantic Sun Conference teams will be in action in four conference games Thursday night and with 13 of the 14 regular season games having been played, very little has been resolved in the standings.
 
Defending champion North Florida is in the driver's seat, leading the A-Sun with a 9-4 record. However, NJIT, Florida Gulf Coast and Jacksonville are all at 8-5 and all three of the them could finish in a first-place tie if North Florida loses.
 
The standings are used to seed the Atlantic Sun Conference Tournament, which begins on March 1 and NJIT knows two important things.
 
The first is that the Highlanders can't be the top seed even if they tie for first place. The reason is that the Highlanders lost both games to North Florida.
 
The second is that NJIT will be seeded somewhere between #2 and #4, depending on how the final regular season games go on Thursday. As a result, the Highlanders will be hosting an A-Sun Tournament game on Thursday, March 1, in the Fleisher Athletic Center at 7:30 pm against an opponent to be determined. A sellout is expected, so NJIT fans are encouraged to get their tickets in advance. Here is a link to NJITTix.com for online advance purchases.
 
But first things first, the Highlanders have unfinished business in South Carolina at USC Upstate in the regular season finale.
 
First meeting
NJIT's first-ever Atlantic Sun Conference game was played at home on January 9 and the opponent was USC Upstate.
 
The Highlanders had a lot of reason for optimism. NJIT had been picked third in the A-Sun coaches' preseason poll and Upstate, which played in the 2015 conference championship game, but had sustained graduation losses, was picked sixth.
 
On top of that, the Highlanders were home in the Fleisher Athletic Center, where they had gone 15-2 in 2014-15 and begin this season 5-2 in the pre-conference portion of the schedule. And the visiting team, USC Upstate was 1-6 in its pre-conference road games.
 
Against that backdrop, the Highlanders got a taste of the intensity that has characterized Atlantic Sun basketball all season. The Spartans built a 46-33 lead by halftime and led for most of the second half and NJIT did not claim the lead until a little more than three minutes remained in the game.
 
In the end, it came down to a 78-78 tie and Upstate in possession of the ball. The Spartans missed their first shot, but 6-foot-11, 250-pound junior Michael Buchanan went above everyone for the winning tip-in with 4/10 of a second on the game clock and the Spartans left town with the win.
 
A LOOK at USC Upstate (9-21; 3-10 A-Sun)
Wins have been hard to come by for the Spartans since that heady Saturday afternoon in January at NJIT. In fact, the Spartans have won just once on the road since then.
 
However, they are far from an easy out. In the last game at A-Sun leader North Florida, they took the defending champs to the end, losing 81-78 and finishing the game with two misses in the dying seconds in a futile bid to force overtime.
 
Facing the two teams tied for second place with NJIT, Upstate took an 81-76 loss vs. Jacksonville and an 81-74 defeat vs. FGCU.
 
The Spartans are guided by Eddie Payne, who is in his 14th season at USC Upstate and his 31st as a college head coach, having led teams at five colleges prior to Upstate. … One of his stops was Oregon State (1995-2000) and he led East Carolina into the 1993 NCAA Tournament. … He has amassed 469 college head coaching wins. … Coach Payne took over at Upstate when the Spartans competed in Division II and led it into Division I, beginning in 2006-07 (the same season in which NJIT played its first DI schedule).
 
USC Upstate team stats and leaders:
Scoring (team 72.5 ppg; -5.2 ppg): Deion Holmes (6-3, Fr; 12.4 ppg); Michael Buchanan (6-11 Jr; 11.7 ppg); Mike Cunningham (6-1, Fr; 9.5 ppg); Josh Cuthbertson (6-5, Jr; 9.5 ppg)
Rebounding (team 38.4 rpg; +1.8 rpg): Buchanan (5.9 rpg); Marvin Smith (6-6, Sr; 4.6 rpg)
Assists: Cunningham (81); Cuthbertson (78)
Blocks: Buchanan (29)
Steals: Cunningham (24)
3-pt FGM: Holmes (53)
 
A LOOK at NJIT (17-12; 8-5 A-Sun)
NJIT showed its resilience last weekend in Jacksonville, FL.
 
On Thursday night, with a share of first place on the line, the Highlanders were routed by defending champion North Florida.
 
With two days to regroup from Thursday's disappointment, NJIT went across town and scored a wire-to-wire win at Jacksonville, 73-58, knocking the Dolphins out of first place.
 
NJIT team stats and leaders:
Scoring (team 75.9 ppg; +1.6 ppg): Damon Lynn (5-11 Jr; 18 ppg); Tim Coleman (6-5, Jr; 13.7 ppg); Ky Howard (6-4, Sr; 13 ppg);
Rebounding (team 34.7 rpg; -1.4 rpg): Coleman (7.1 rpg); Howard (4.6 rpg); Terrence Smith (6-6, Jr; 4.3 rpg)
Assists: Howard (127)
Blocks: Coleman (25)
Steals: Lynn (49); Coleman (42)
3-pt FGM: Lynn (98)
 
How to watch NJIT sports programming on ESPN3
ESPN3 is the live platform for at least 23 NJIT men's basketball games this season. Every NJIT game in the Atlantic Sun Conference throughout the regular season and into the A-Sun postseason tournament will be covered on ESPN3. 
 
ESPN3 is ESPN's live multi-screen sports network.  It is accessible online at WatchESPN.com, on smartphones and tablets via the WatchESPN app and streamed on televisions through Amazon Fire TV and Fire TV Stick, Apple TV, Chromecast, Roku, Xbox 360 and Xbox One. 
 
The network is currently available to more than 99 million homes at no additional cost to fans who receive their high-speed Internet connection or video subscription from an affiliated service provider. 
 
ESPN3 is also available at no cost to approximately 21 million U.S. college students and U.S.-based military personnel via computers, smartphones and tablets connected to on-campus educational and on-base military broadband and Wi-Fi networks. That means devices served by NJIT's on-campus computer network can link directly to ESPN3.
 
Others can access ESPN3 through WatchESPN if they receive ESPN programming from an affiliated service provider. Those users need to provide the username and password they use in online communication with their regular service provider (can usually be found on regular billing material from the service provider).
 
Here is a link to Frequently Asked Questions about WatchESPN.