Men's Basketball Playing Arkansas-Pine Bluff on Friday

The Ball State men's basketball team hosts Arkansas-Pine Bluff on Friday at 2 p.m. in its second and final game of the Midwest Madness: Cardinal Classic.

The Cardinals (4-1) and Lions (3-3) are scheduled to play for the first time in series history. Ball State beat USC Upstate 75-58 on Tuesday night in the first game of the Cardinal Classic going into the Thanksgiving holiday. This will be the fifth home game among a six-game stretch to begin the season for the Cardinals.

Mickey Pearson Jr. scored a career-best 24 points on Tuesday to help Ball State triumph over the Upstate Spartans and improve to 4-0 in home games in the 2023-24 season. Basheer Jihad (12 points), Davion Bailey (11) and Jalin Anderson (10) also finished in double figures for the hosts, who led for the balance of the contest.

Arkansas-Pine Bluff, of the Southwestern Athletic Conference, has 20-point losses at Missouri on Nov. 6 and Minnesota on Nov. 21, but won 85-83 at Central Arkansas in their second road game on their slate. The Lions other wins came against National Christian College Athletics Association Member Champion Christian (116-73 on Nov. 9) and National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics member Southwestern Christian (112-68 on Nov. 11).

Ball State recorded a 20-12 record (11-7 Mid-American Conference) in 2022-23 to earn the No. 4 seed in the MAC Tournament. Head coach Michael Lewis enters his second season leading the Cardinals after recent stops as an assistant at UCLA, Nebraska and Butler.

Juniors Pearson Jr. and Jihad headline the returners, as they averaged 7.7 points and 5.5 rebounds and 7.1 points and 3.6 rebounds per game, respectively, in 2022-23. Three transfers and five true freshmen bolster Ball State's 2023-24 team.

SCOUTING ARKANSAS-PINE BLUFF: The Lions went 10-21 (6-12 SWAC) last season in head coach Solomon Bozeman's second leading the program. Bozeman was an assistant at Oral Roberts for three seasons before arriving in Pine Bluff.

Junior guard Kylen Milton (21.2 points per game) and graduate guard Rashad Williams (20.0) provide a potent backcourt scoring duo for the Lions, while fellow guards Joe French (15.2) and Lonnell Martin Jr. (11.2) also average in double figures. Milton also leads the team in assists (19), field goal percentage (.619) and 3-point shooting (.524).

Milton paces the SWAC in points (127, eighth nationally) and points per game (20^th), while Williams ranks No. 5 in NCAA Division I in 3-pointers made per game at 3.83 through six games.

CARDINAL DIRECTIONS

Jihad leads the Cardinals in scoring (15.6 points per game) and rebounding (5.6) averages. The scoring and rebounding efforts at Evansville tied career highs for the junior out of Detroit. The junior's scoring average is ninth in the Mid-American Conference behind leader Tyson Acuff's 20.8 points per game for Eastern Michigan.
The Cardinals lead the MAC and rank in the Top 25 nationally in scoring defense (58.2 points per game, 11^th), 3-point percentage defense (24.1, 18^th) and turnover margin (+5.6, 21^st).
Ball State's 20 wins last year were its most since 2016-17 when that team won 21. This season's Cardinals will look for back-to-back 20-win schedules for the first time since that 2016-17 season.
The Cardinals are a young group, as the roster includes only one senior or graduate student (Ethan Brittain-Watts). Ball State returns only 21.5 percent of minutes played and 19.6 percent of points scored from last year's team.
Brittain-Watts (Boston University), Jalin Anderson (Loyola Marymount) and Davion Bailey (Southeastern CC) form Ball State's trio of transfers.
Joey Brown (Indianapolis), Zane Doughty (Indianapolis), Mason Jones (Valparaiso, Ind.), Trent Middleton Jr. (Philadelphia) and Jurica Zagorsak (Zadar, Croatia) are the Cardinals' quintet of true freshmen.
Ball State recently signed forward Jai Anthoni Bearden (Phoenix, Ariz.) and guard Jermarhi "Fatt" Hill (Bessemer, Ala.) to national letters of intent to form the Cardinals' 2024 recruiting class.

Up Next
Ball State plays at Little Rock at 7:30 p.m. ET (6:30 p.m. CT) on Tuesday in its second road game on the season.

Men's Basketball Playing Arkansas-Pine Bluff on Friday

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Players Mentioned

Jalin Anderson

Davion Bailey

Ethan Brittain-Watts

Joey Brown

Zane Doughty

Basheer Jihad

Mason Jones

Trent Middleton Jr.

Mickey Pearson Jr.

Jurica Zagorsak