Pride on the line as UTSA hosts first-place Old Dominion


Old Dominion players stage a dunking exhibition in warmups for today’s game at UTSA.

The Old Dominion Monarchs walloped the UTSA Roadrunners 100-62 a year ago in Norfolk, Virginia.

It’s still a painful memory for the Roadrunners, who remember that ODU guard B.J. Stith exploded for 28 of his game-high 36 points before halftime.

Keaton Wallace. UTSA beat Southeastern Oklahoma State 70-67 on Saturday, Dec. 29, 2018, at the UTSA Convocation Center. - photo by Joe Alexander

UTSA sophomore Keaton Wallace averages 18.8 points per game on the season but is scoring 19.7 in conference. – Photo by Joe Alexander

The Monarchs led by 16 at intermission, broke out to a 29-point lead with 13 minutes remaining and then polished off a 38-point victory when a freshman, Marquis Godwin, hit a three-pointer with a minute remaining.

“That was a bad game for us,” UTSA guard Keaton Wallace said. “I remember that dude got hot on us. (B.J.) Stith ended up getting hot on us, and it was hard for us to come back after that, so we owe them.”

Payback is only part of the motivation today as the Roadrunners host the Monarchs at 3 p.m. at the Convocation Center.

First place in Conference USA is also at stake.

“You know, we didn’t specifically talk to our players about it being for a piece of the lead,” UTSA coach Steve Henson said. “It’s a big game for a lot of reasons. Our guys respect Old Dominion. They’ve been a terrific program.”

Old Dominion is in first in the C-USA standings at 6-2, followed by UTSA, North Texas, Marshall and UAB, all tied at 5-2.

On Thursday night, the Roadrunners rolled to an 88-43 home victory over the Charlotte 49ers, while the Monarchs won on the road, 50-48, over the UTEP Miners.

Leading by 11 points with nine minutes lef, the Monarchs scrambled to hold off the Miners with two defensive stops in the final minute.

Coach Steve Henson (left) and assistant Mike Peck have led UTSA into a tie for second place in Conference USA. – Photo by Joe Alexander

Today, they’ll show up at the Convocation Center with a swagger, led by Stith and Ahmad Caver, not to mention a deep pool of other quality athletes.

“You know, they do a good job,” Henson said Friday afternoon. “They’ve got an identity. They keep guys in their system. They have veteran guys. (They’re a) great defensive team, (with) two superstars.”

That being said, Henson acknowledged that the Roadrunners are feeling good, without too many nagging injuries and are playing with confidence.

“So, it’ll be exciting to see our guys respond,” he said.

This year, the C-USA’s schedule is different.

On Feb. 16, the conference will divide the 14 teams into three groups based on the standings, with teams in each tier, or pod, playing round robin to determine the final seedings for the C-USA tournament.

Wallace said he is keeping an eye on the standings every day.

“I’m trying to get that top five for the top-five pod,” he said, “so we can play for first.”

C-USA standings

Old Dominion 6-2, 16-5
North Texas 5-2, 17-3
UAB 5-2, 13-7
Marshall 5-2, 12-8
UTSA 5-2, 11-9
FIU 4-3, 13-7
WKU 4-3, 11-9
LA Tech 4-4, 14-7
Rice 3-4, 8-12
SouthernMiss 3-5, 11-9
FAU 2-5, 11-9
MiddleTenn 2-5, 5-15
Charlotte 2-6, 5-14
UTEP 1-6, 6-12

Today’s games

Old Dominion at UTSA, 3 p.m.
WKU at LA Tech, 4 p.m.
Marshall at Southern Miss, 4 p.m.
Middle Tennessee at North Texas, 5 p.m.
FAU at FIU, 6 p.m.
UAB at Rice, 7 p.m.
Charlotte at UTEP, 8 p.m.

UTSA clinches spot in C-USA tournament with victory at ODU

The UTSA Roadrunners have clinched a spot in the Conference USA baseball tournament.

UTSA assured itself of a chance to play for the C-USA’s postseason title by scoring an 11-3 victory Sunday at Old Dominion.

With the win, the Roadrunners took two of three in the series from the last-place Monarchs.

More importantly, in the long term, the win also settles UTSA’s travel plans for the last week of May.

UTSA will make the trip to Biloxi, Miss., as one of eight C-USA teams battling for the postseason title and the accompanying bid to the NCAA tournament.

Records

UTSA 28-21, 14-12
Old Dominion 15-33, 7-19

Highlights

Bryan Arias, a UTSA junior from Marshall, led off the game with his seventh home run of the season. The Roadrunners went on to score one run in the first inning, two in the second and one in the third for a 4-0 lead.

UTSA banged out 16 hits one day after getting shut out, 7-0, on a complete-game, five-hitter by ODU’s Morgan Maguire. Trent Bowles had three hits for UTSA, including his team-leading 16th double. He also stole his 14th base, which also leads the team.

Pitcher Chance Kirby enjoyed another quality start by pitching into the seventh inning and yielding two runs on seven hits. Kirby has eclipsed six innings pitched with two or fewer runs allowed in four straight games.

After picking up the win against Old Dominion, he improved his record to 5-4 with a team-best 2.93 earned run average.

Coming up

UTSA hosts Abilene Christian (non-conference) on Tuesday. UTSA completes the regular-season schedule next weekend with three home games against the C-USA’s Charlotte 49ers starting Thursday night.

The C-USA tournament is set for May 24-28 in Biloxi.

Old Dominion even series against UTSA with 7-0 victory

Morgan Maguire threw a complete-game shutout Saturday as the last-place Old Dominion Monarchs defeated UTSA 7-0 at Norfolk Va., in Conference USA baseball.

With the victory, Old Dominion evened the three-game series at one win apiece leading into Sunday’s series finale.

Maguire allowed five hits while striking out seven a day after UTSA pounded ODU pitching in an 11-1 victory.

For UTSA, it was the team’s fifth shutout loss of the season and first since April 8, when Louisiana Tech won 13-0 in San Antonio.

This one might sting a little more than usual.

The loss prevented the Roadrunners from winning the series on the second-to-last weekend of the regular season.

It also dropped them into a tie for fifth in the standings with FIU.

After Sunday’s series finale against ODU in Virginia, UTSA returns home to face Abilene Christian in nonconference play Tuesday.

The Roadrunners host the Charlotte 49ers in C-USA next weekend.

Records

Old Dominion — 15-32, 7-18
UTSA — 27-21, 13-12

B.J. Stith scores 36 as Old Dominion throttles UTSA, 100-62

UTSA coach Steve Henson looks forward to playing at last-place Charlotte on Saturday night and trying to find a spark.

Trying to start a new winning streak. Trying anything to forget about Thursday night in Norfolk, Virginia.

After B.J. Stith and the Old Dominion Monarchs dominated in a 100-62 victory, Henson seemed to have a hard time shaking the feeling of his team’s worst loss of the season.

“We can’t let this destroy what we’ve done the last few weeks,” Henson said on the team’s radio broadcast. “We’ve been doing good things. We just got man-handled tonight.

“It was grown men just taking us to school. We didn’t have much response to it.”

Stith produced a career-high 36 points and pulled down 10 rebounds for the Monarchs, who won their fourth in a row.

In winning their eighth game out of nine, Old Dominion improved to 20-5 overall and 11-2 in Conference USA.

Winners of four straight coming in, UTSA fell to 14-12 and 7-6.

The 38-point margin of defeat eclipsed a 24-point loss that UTSA suffered at Middle Tennessee on Jan. 25 as the worst of the season.

Stith made an early statement, hitting a three-pointer 20 seconds into the game and then scoring 28 by halftime.

By that time, the Monarchs were in charge, 52-36.

“He was just fantastic in the first half,” Henson said. “He was pretty good overall. He just had a real good rhythm going and got hot and made threes. Got to the free-throw line. Did a little bit of everything.”

Jackson breaks UTSA freshman record

UTSA guard Jhivvan Jackson moved up to No. 1 in the UTSA record books for points scored by a freshman, surpassing Devin Brown.

Jackson pumped in 22, giving him 488 for the season.

Brown, who later played in the NBA and won a championship ring with the Spurs, scored 483 for the Roadrunners in 1998-99.

Around the C-USA

The struggling Charlotte 49ers fell to 5-19 overall and 1-12 in the conference after an 87-86 home loss to UTEP.

After Thursday’s games, Middle Tennessee leads the C-USA at 13-1, followed by Old Dominion and Western Kentucky at 13-2. Marshall is fourth at 9-4.

UTSA and North Texas are tied for fifth at 7-6, while Louisiana Tech and Alabama-Birmingham are next at 7-7.

After that, it’s Southern Miss (6-8), Florida International (5-8), Florida Atlantic (4-9), UTEP (3-10), Rice (2-11) and Charlotte (1-12).

Nearly tournament time

The top four teams in the standings get a first-round bye in the C-USA tournament, set for March 7-10 at Frisco. The top 12 teams qualify.