{"id":525314,"date":"2026-03-07T20:11:11","date_gmt":"2026-03-07T20:11:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/525314\/"},"modified":"2026-03-07T20:11:11","modified_gmt":"2026-03-07T20:11:11","slug":"mens-basketball-closes-regular-season-against-utsa-on-senior-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/525314\/","title":{"rendered":"Men\u2019s Basketball Closes Regular Season against UTSA on Senior Day"},"content":{"rendered":"

HOUSTON\u00a0\u2014 Rice closes its regular season this Sunday, Mar. 8, when it hosts UTSA on Senior Day. Tip-off is scheduled for 2 p.m. CT, and the game will be streamed by ESPN+.
\n\u00a0
\nGame 31
\nWhat: Rice (12-18, 6-11) vs. UTSA (5-24, 1-16)
\nWhen: Sunday, March 8 at 2 p.m. CT
\nWhere: Houston, Texas
\nStadium: Tudor Fieldhouse (5,208)
\nTickets: RiceOwls.com<\/a>
\nWatch: ESPN+<\/a>
\nListen: RiceOwls.com<\/a>
\nLive Stats: RiceOwls.com<\/a>
\nSeries Information: North Texas leads 26-10 (Leads 12-2 in Denton)<\/p>\n

Scouting Rice

\n\u2022 Rice enters Sunday’s game with a 12-18 record and is 6-11 in the American. The Owls are coming off a 62-58 defeat at North Texas on Wednesday.

\n\u2022 Graduate guard Trae Broadnax<\/a> leads the team with 15.7 points, 5.2 rebounds, 3.2 assists, and 1.2 steals. He’s also connecting on 79.6% from the free throw line and 32.5% from three.

\n\u2022 Senior guard\/forward Nick Anderson<\/a> is second on the team with 15.4 points per game while adding 4.3 rebounds. He is second in the league in three-point percentage (39.4%) and fifth in three-pointers made per game (2.6), while placing seventh in free throw percentage (81.2%).

\n\u2022 Redshirt senior guard Jalen Smith<\/a> is scoring 12.1 points per game and is second on the team with 2.3 assists. He’s third in the conference in three-point field goal percentage (39.1%) and sixth with 2.5 three-pointers per game.

\n\u2022 Junior forward Jimmy Oladokun, Jr.<\/a>, is second on the team with 5.0 rebounds, and redshirt senior center Stephen Giwa<\/a> is pulling down 4.7 boards and ranks 10th in the league with 1.1 blocks.

\n\u2022 Rice is averaging 73.7 points per game while allowing 74.7.

\n\u2022 The Owls are connecting on 42.1% from the field and 35.3% from beyond the arc, which is second in the conference. Their opponents are connecting on 44.1% from the floor and 33.5% from three.

\n\u2022 Rice is outrebounding its opponents, 37.7-to-36.3.

\n\u2022 The Owls are third in the league in three-pointers, making 9.1 per game, while placing 12th in the nation with 13.7 offensive rebounds per game.

\n\u2022 Head coach Rob Lanier<\/a> is in his second season at the helm of the Rice men’s basketball program.<\/p>\n

Scouting UTSA

\n\u2022 UTSA enters Sunday’s game with a 5-24 record and is 1-16 in the American. The Roadrunners have dropped four straight after falling to Wichita State last Sunday, 84-67.

\n\u2022 Graduate student guard Jamir Simpson is the only Roadrunner averaging double-figures, leading the team with 16.3 points per game, good for seventh in the league. He’s also averaging 4.1 rebounds and 2.4 assists.

\n\u2022 Redshirt junior guard Austin Nunez is second on the squad with 9.8 points while adding a team-high 2.8 assists.

\n\u2022 Junior guard\/forward Brent Moss is third on the team with 9.4 points and sophomore forward Baboucarr Njie is averaging 9.2 points and is fourth in the conference with 1.6 blocks.

\n\u2022 UTSA is scoring a league-low 69.4 points per game, but is allowing a league-high 80.8.

\n\u2022 The Roadrunners are connecting on 40.0% from the floor and 29.9% from three. Their opponents are connecting on 44.9% from the floor and 34.4% from three.

\n\u2022 UTSA is being outrebounded the opposition, 41.2-to-35.9.

\n\u2022 UTSA is third in the conference in blocks with 4.4 per game.

\n\u2022 Head coach Austin Claunch is in his second season at the helm of the UTSA men’s basketball program, where he has a 17-43 record. In seven seasons as a head coach, he is 107-104.

\n\u00a0

\nRice-UTSA Series History

\n\u2022 Rice and UTSA will meet for the second time this year and the 28th time overall.

\n\u2022 UTSA holds a 15-12 record in the series, but it is tied at seven when played in Houston.

\n\u2022 The first six meetings came as non-conference foes. Since 2014, the teams have competed as conference foes when UTSA joined Conference USA. The Roadrunners hold an 11-10 advantage as conference opponents.

\n\u2022 Rice earned an 89-73 victory at UTSA on Jan. 14.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HOUSTON\u00a0\u2014 Rice closes its regular season this Sunday, Mar. 8, when it hosts UTSA on Senior Day. Tip-off…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":525315,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[574],"tags":[64,63,726,85],"class_list":["post-525314","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-basketball","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-basketball","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/525314","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=525314"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/525314\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/525315"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=525314"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=525314"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=525314"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}