TicketsARKANSAS-PINE BLUFF (0-12) at No. 20/22 CINCINNATI (9-2)
SERIES INFO: Fourth meeting; Cincinnati leads 3-0 overall and 3-0 at home
LAST MEETING: Cincinnati won 99-50 on Nov. 22, 2015 at Fifth Third Arena
STREAK: Cincinnati - 3
COACHES: Mick Cronin is in his 12th season at Cincinnati (246-137); 15th season overall (315-161)
Greg Ivory is in his 10th season at Arkansas-Pine Bluff (105-193); 10th season overall (105-193)
AP/USA TODAY RANKINGS (DEC. 18): Cincinnati (20/22); Arkansas-Pine Bluff (--/--)
RADIO: 700 WLW; Dan Hoard provides play-by-play with color analyst Terry Nelson
TV: ESPN3; Jim Barbar provides play-by-play with color analyst Mark Adams
JOIN THE CONVERSATION (TWITTER, FACEBOOK, INSTAGRAM): @GoBearcatsMBB or GoBearcatsMBB
TICKETS: Start at $20; Available on BB&T Arena Website; TicketMaster by calling 1-800-745-3000;
Sold at BB&T Arena box office beginning two hours prior to the start (depending on availability)
By Bill Koch
GoBearcats.com
CINCINNATI – University of Cincinnati forward Gary Clark is well-versed in all the ways that rebounding can help his team win and why it's so important to him.
"It's the impact of it," Clark said, "giving our team a chance to get a second opportunity. Most teams score like 29 percent on their first attempt and 42 on their second attempt. On defense, it's not giving the other team a second opportunity to score. You can control rebounding. You can't control shots going in, free throws or anything else in the game, but you can control rebounding and effort."
Those reasons are all sound from a basketball standpoint, but there's another, more personal reason why Clark loves to rebound and why it gives him more satisfaction than scoring.
"It's almost like I'm taking another man's will," Clark said. "It's like, oh you're tired and I'm not tired, especially when I constantly get it, possession after possession on the offensive end. Defensive ones are a lot easier than offensive ones. If you get three or four offensive rebounds in one possession or consecutively, you're taking away his will. His coach will sub for him. It feels good."
Clark, who has averaged 12.5 points per game this season, will seek his fourth straight double-figure rebounding game at 7 p.m. Tuesday at BB&T Arena when the Bearcats face winless Arkansas-Pine Bluff (0-12) after completing their most difficult non-league stretch of the season with a 2-2 record, capped by their 77-63 win last Saturday over UCLA. UC enters the game with the nation's longest home winning streak, which stands at 31 games.
In his last four games, Clark – a 6-foot-9, 230-pound senior from Clark, N.C. - has averaged 10.5 points, 11.0 rebounds, 2.3 blocked shots and 2.0 steals.
As a group, UC's big three of Clark, Kyle Washington and Jacob Evans have been at their best recently. Evans was named the American Athletic Conference Player of the Week on Monday after averaging 19 points and 5.3 rebounds while shooting 48.1 percent from the floor during his last four games. And Washington, who needs 13 points to reach 1,000 for his career, first at North Carolina State and now at UC, averaged 17.7 points while shooting 57.7 percent in wins over Mississippi State and UCLA last week. Washington was named the Lute Olson Award National Player of the Week on Monday.
Clark ranks second in the American in rebounds per game with 9.2. He's first in total rebounds with 101 and offensive rebounds with 39. Nationally, he's tied for 48th with 9.2 boards per game and ranks 20th in offensive rebounds per game with 3.55.
What makes Clark so effective?
"He rebounds with two hands," said UC coach Mick Cronin. "There's different kinds of athletes. When you talk about a basketball athlete, it's got nothing to do with dunking. To jump in traffic, you've got to be a two-foot jumper. Charles Barkley would be the greatest example. If you can jump off two feet, then you can rebound the ball with two hands. If you've got to jump off one foot, you're going to have a lower hand. He also has a nose for the ball that you can't teach. He's trying to be one of the best rebounders in the country. It's in his mind. You can see. He's trying to get every rebound."
Clark loves to talk about the art of rebounding. He said he has long understood the importance of jumping off both feet and grabbing the ball with both hands, but he has emphasized it even more in college.
"Being bigger than everyone (in high school), it's really easy to go up with one hand and snatch it down," Clark said. "Here, guys are just as athletic as you, so being able to go get it first and jump off two feet and grab it with two hands first (is important). A lot of guys like (UC's) Mamoudou (Diarra), he has a hard time getting them with two hands because he's so used to being the most athletic guy. Now we know if Mamoudou is going for a rebound, I know that he's not going to snatch it with two hands so I've got an opportunity to steal it and get an extra rebound in practice. Two-hand rebounds are a guaranteed rebound. One hand is 50 percent."
Clark admits that he's not the most athletic player on the team, so he understands that positioning and technique are crucial for him.
"If you ask any of our players or our coaching staff I'm on the lower end of our athleticism," he said. "I was right behind Troy (Caupain) last year and this year I think I'm right behind Trevor Moore and Jarron Cumberland as being the most non-athletic guys.
"But you know, here and there I have my athletic moments, so I think it's a combination of both, getting the position and the effort and trying to rebound on every possession because guys get tired. When guys get tired they don't go as hard as they do at the beginning of the game. For me, it's just become second nature just to always go to get an offensive rebound or a defensive rebound."
Cronin has preached to Clark since his arrival at UC that rebounding can be his ticket to the NBA.
"It's the one stat that every NBA GM will tell you translates from college to the pros," Cronin said.
Clark has wholeheartedly bought into that notion. It's why after nearly every game the first thing he wants to know is not how many points he scored, but how many rebounds he seized. He's also driven to finish among the top five in UC history in rebounds. He currently has 920. He needs 64 more to pass Dwight Jones for fifth place.
The bottom line for Clark is that rebounding is just plain fun. He enjoys seeing the reaction from his opponents when he's repeatedly beating them to the glass.
"The other day (at UCLA) against the big guy (Thomas) Welsh, you could hear him mumbling to his other guys and his guards mumbling to him about we need a rebound," Clark said. "I think he got one and he just had so much emotion for the first time the whole game because he got one. I'm looking at the ref like, it was foul, but he got one."
Maybe the affable Clark has a mean streak after all.
Bill Koch covered UC athletics for 27 years – 15 at The Cincinnati Post and 12 at The Cincinnati Enquirer – before joining the staff of GoBearcats.com in January 2015.