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Men's Basketball Set for No. 1 Houston Tuesday

The Cincinnati men's basketball team will complete its Texas road trip with Houston at 7 p.m. ET on Tuesday night.

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Men's Basketball Set for No. 1 Houston TuesdayMen's Basketball Set for No. 1 Houston Tuesday
CINCINNATI -- The Cincinnati men's basketball team will complete its Texas road trip with Houston at 7 p.m. ET on Tuesday night.

THE RUNDOWN
  • TCU rode an 8-0 start and made six of its first 10 second-half shots to defeat Cincinnati in the first leg of its trip. The Bearcats then bused to Houston ahead of practices at Texas Southern and Rice on Sunday and Monday to prepare for the Cougars.
  • One interesting development in the TCU game was point guards Day Day Thomas and Jizzle James sharing the floor for 14:57, the most of any game this season. Save for a few minutes throughout conference play, the duo did not play together until late in the Dec. 16 Dayton contest, followed by 10:15 against Merrimack the next game.
  • James played 25 minutes against TCU, matching his career-high (Iowa State). In that game against the Cyclones, he scored 16 points on a career-high four treys on six attempts. Only one other freshman has scored more on Iowa State's vaunted defense.
  • Cincinnati went two-bigs in its starting lineup until the Big 12 opener against BYU, when Aziz Bandaogo came off the bench as a game-time decision due to injury.
  • Jamille Reynolds' best stretch of the season continued with nine points in 14 minutes against TCU. He is 16-for-26 (61.5 percent) from the field in the last seven games, including 9-for-10 at the foul line in the last three.
  • Viktor Lakhin returned to the rotation with 14 minutes on Saturday after playing 9 against Iowa State, one possession against UCF and missing the Oklahoma State game. As UC's third-leading scorer last year (11.6 ppg) and the top one most of this season (9.9), his presence can play a pivotal role down the stretch. CJ Fredrick was also out against the Frogs due to injury.
  • Simas Lukosius, UC's top 3-point shooter, is 6-for-10 from deep the last two games to go with eight assists.
  • Houston is one of four teams to win the rebounding battle against Cincinnati (TCU twice, Oklahoma), who remains the Big 12 leader and ninth nationally at +8.8 per game. The Cougars had 17 offensive boards that included an 11-1 overall jump to start the game. Even with the sizeable jump to the Big 12, Cincinnati was 101 in boards last year and 211 in Wes Miller's first year, 2021-22.
  • A win over Houston would be UC's highest since No. 2 Syracuse in the 2012 Big East Tourney.
SERIES HISTORY
  • Cincinnati leads the all-time series 33-15, and the two teams' 125 AAC wins are tied for the league record.
  • The two teams were in the Missouri Valley together from 1956-60, then Conference USA from 1996-05 before becoming charter AAC members from 2013-23.
  • The Bearcats also won 27 of the first 28 meetings (1957-2016). These now-Big 12 foes faced each other in three-straight AAC Championship games, with UC coming out on top in 2018 and 2019. The two teams were also the top seeds in 2020, but the tourney never began due to COVID-19. UH won in the 2021 clash.
  • Houston left Cincinnati with a 67-62 win on Feb. 10 by way of a 19-3 run early in the second half to overcome a 3-point halftime deficit.
  • Day Day Thomas and Jizzle James helped hold Jamal Shead to 6-of-25 shooting, and John Newman III secured his first Cincinnati double-double with 10 points and 10 rebounds.
  • Cincinnati trailed by as many as 13 in the first half, but used stifling defense to limit Houston to just one field goal in its final 13 attempts of the first half to grab a 32-29 lead at the break. It was down 61-59 with 1:41 left but couldn't close the gap.
  • Cincinnati was close to knocking off the No. 3 Cougars in their home arena last year, falling 75-69 after it was tied with 1:21 left. UC reeled off a 16-0 run early in the game to lead 19-6.

KELVIN SAMPSON ON JIZZLE JAMES

  • Houston head coach Kelvin Sampson, of 19 NCAA Tournaments and a pair of Final Fours over his illustrous career, spoke highly of the Bearcat rookie.
  • "He doesn't look like a freshman, does he? He's a big, strong guard with great quickness. I like his game a lot, and he's only gonna get better. Jizzle James, I just like saying his name. I would never call him Edgerrin James, Jr. We've played against some real good guards here, and one of the best I ever went against was (former Cincinnati All-American) Steve Logan."