After a successful opener to the Chicago Invitational Tournament, in a 92-60 win over Longwood, the BYU men’s basketball team hosts the Prairie View A&M Panthers on Tuesday in the second game of the tournament.
As BYU head coach Dave Rose watched the film of Prairie View A&M in their first game of the tournament, a 60-47 loss to Nevada, he was impressed with the way the Panthers played.
[/media-credit]
The Cougars have been led in scoring by three different players in their first three games this season. Forward Noah Hartsock scored 18 against Utah State, center Brandon Davies scored 25 in a win over BYU-Hawaii and Charles Abouo scored 19 versus Longwood. The team’s balance is an attribute Rose feels will continue to help the team throughout the year.
“The other night I was really please with four guys in double figures and a lot of other guys with seven, eight and nine points,” he said. “That’ll really help us in the long run. Guys just need to keep getting better and the more games we play, they will just keep getting better.”
The Panthers, which currently hold a 2-2 record, have been led by guards Louis Munks and Jourdan DeMuynck. Munks is currently averaging 10.8 points per game and DeMuynck is averaging 10.5 points.
BYU has been successful in their defense schemes against high scoring guards so far this season. The Cougars held Division II preseason All-American Jet Chang to only 12 points in their win over BYU-Hawaii and held Longwood’s season leading scorer Jeramiah Bowman to just six points. Rose placed senior captain Charles Abouo on both Chang and Bowman, and plans to give Abouo the assignment to shut down the Prairie View A&M guards as well.
“Charles is a guy who’s ready for that,” Rose said. “Charles gets the assignment of their best scorer. We’ll see some pretty good scorers tomorrow night so we need to also do a good job of preparing as a team defensively.”
Another way the Cougars are preparing for the Panthers’ guard play is by practicing against a familiar face, NBA rookie and former Cougar Jimmer Fredette. While the NBA lockout continues, Fredette is working out at BYU and has practiced with the team on a few occasions.
“That definitely helps out a lot because he never misses for one thing,” BYU guard Anson Winder said. “He puts a lot of pressure on us to guard him, so it definitely helps us prepare.”
Before the game, fans are invited to stop by the new BYU Broadcast Building, just east of the Marriott Center, between 4 and 6:30 p.m. to donate canned food to the BYU versus University of Utah Food Drive. For every three cans of food donated, or for a cash donation of $3, fans will receive one free ticket to the game.
Tipoff for the game is at 7 p.m. and it can be watched on BYUtv or heard on KSL news radio.
