Bison Take Shot at Conference Title to the Road

NDSU visits Oral Roberts and Omaha to close out the regular season

February 20, 2017

FARGO, N.D. (NDSU Atheletics) — The Games: The North Dakota State men’s basketball team (18-9, 10-4) travels to Oral Roberts (8-21, 4-11) on Wednesday, Feb. 22, and Omaha (14-13, 7-7) on Saturday, Feb. 25, to close out the regular season. The Bison enter the week in a first-place tie with South Dakota.

Feb. 22 at Oral Roberts 7 p.m. CT ESPN3

Feb. 25 at Omaha 7 p.m. CT

Where to Watch: Wednesday’s game at Oral Roberts will be available on ESPN3 and the WatchESPN app. Saturday’s game at Omaha will only be available via live stream on OMavs.com.

Radio: Both games will be broadcast on 107.9 The Fox, as well as being streamed on the 107.9 The Fox app and GoBison.com/allaccess. Jeff Culhane (play-by-play) will call the action.

About Oral Roberts: The Golden Eagles are 7-5 at home this year, but were officially eliminated from Summit League Tournament contention with IUPUI’s win over Denver on Sunday.

The Golden Eagles rank 30th in the nation in free throw percentage at 75.6 percent. Defensively, ORU ranks 310th in the country in field goal percentage with opponents shooting 46.9 percent on the year. Junior center Albert Owens is averaging 17.2 points and 5.4 rebounds, and senior guard Jalen Bradley is scoring 14.0 points per contest.

Scott Sutton is in his 18th season as the head coach at Oral Roberts.

The Series with Oral Roberts: Wednesday will be the 21st meeting between North Dakota State and Oral Roberts dating back to 1967-68. ORU leads the series 11-9. The Bison have not won in Tulsa since Feb. 28, 2009 — a victory that clinched an outright conference title for NDSU.

Last Time vs. Oral Roberts: The Bison trailed Oral Roberts by 13 points with 15 minutes remaining, but closed with a furious comeback to earn an 81-71 victory on Jan. 25 in Fargo. NDSU made nine of its final 10 shots to pull out the victory. In the final 13:54 of the game, the Bison outscored Oral Roberts 42-20.

Oral Roberts was led by 28 points and nine rebounds from junior forward Albert Owens. NDSU senior forward Dexter Werner scored all 19 of his points in the second half after playing only two minutes in the first half due to foul trouble.

About Omaha: The Mavericks are 7-4 at home this season. Omaha plays at Denver on Wednesday night before hosting the Bison on Saturday.

Senior guard Marcus Tyus leads Omaha in scoring with 16.8 points per game, and junior forward Tre’Shawn Thurman is averaging 13.5 points and 7.7 rebounds per contest. Omaha ranks 17th in the country in scoring with 83.5 points per game, and the Mavs are in the NCAA’s top 15 in free throws made and attempted this year.

Head coach Derrin Hansen is in his 12th season at Omaha.

The Series with Omaha: Saturday will be the 77th meeting between North Dakota State and Omaha dating back to 1935-36. NDSU has a 46-30 lead in the series.

Last Time vs. Omaha: NDSU posted an outstanding second-half performance, pulling away for an 82-70 victory over the Omaha Mavericks on Dec. 31 inside the Scheels Center.

For the second straight game, the Bison scored 50-plus points over the final 20 minutes, outscoring Omaha 53-42 in the second half. NDSU junior guard Paul Miller scored a game-high 22 points. Bison senior Dexter Werner tallied 17 points and 13 rebounds – with 11 of those rebounds coming in the second half.