Men's Basketball Hosting Franklin College Friday for Home Opener

The Ball State men's basketball team is set to host Franklin College at 5 p.m. on Friday in the home opener at Worthen Arena.

The game will be streamed on ESPN+ with Brayden Carroll and Griffin Leonard on the call, while Mick Tidrow and David Eha handle the radio broadcast on WMUN 1340AM - 92.5FM. This will be the 65^th meeting in the series between the Cardinals and Grizzlies, with Ball State leading 39-25. The two teams last met in 1969.

Ball State went 15-16 (7-11 MAC) last season but added five transfers and three true freshmen to the mix while returning starters Mason Jones and Mickey Pearson Jr. The Cardinals fell 71-66 at Georgia State on Monday night in the season opener.

Franklin finished 12-14 (10-8 Heartland Collegiate Athletic Conference) last season for a tie for fifth place in the 10-team HCAC, which is an NCAA Division III conference. The Grizzlies were picked sixth in the preseason coaches poll and return All-Conference performers Lynn King, Jessie Morgan III, Braden Flanagan and Ryan Bostic.

Next up for the Cardinals is a road game at Dayton at 7 p.m. this coming Wednesday.

CARDINAL DIRECTIONS

Ball State features a revamped roster bolstered by five incoming transfers and three true freshmen while returning a majority of the frontcourt from last season's team including Mickey Pearson Jr., Ben Hendriks and Mason Jones.
The Cardinals were picked to finish sixth in the Mid-American Conference by the Blue Ribbon College Basketball Yearbook and seventh by the league's head coaches in the preseason poll released in late October.
The Cardinals' roster is deep in experience with four sixth-year seniors in Ethan Brittain-Watts, Ben Hendriks, Jeremiah Hernandez and Mickey Pearson Jr. Ball State has the most student-athletes in their sixth year of college of any men's basketball team in NCAA Division I (Southern Miss has three sixth-year and two seventh-year seniors).
Ball State's student-athletes have played in 603 games and made 254 starts at the Division I level entering the season, while Hernandez and Payton Sparks have been All-Conference performers.
Sparks was recently picked First Team All-MAC in the preseason poll after being a two-time Second Team selection in his first two seasons in Muncie. Hernandez averaged 17.2 points and 3.3 rebounds per game last season at USI to be named First Team All-Ohio Valley Conference.

IN-STATE BATTLES: Ball State is set to host Franklin (Nov. 8), Indiana State (Nov. 16), Evansville (Dec. 21) and Anderson (Dec. 31) for a quartet of in-state rivalries this season.

The men's basketball program hasn't hosted at least four teams from the state of Indiana since 2013-14 when that team played Taylor, Butler, Valparaiso and Oakland City at Worthen Arena.

PEARSON POUNDING THE GLASS: Mickey Pearson Jr. tied his career-best with 13 rebounds in Monday's season opener at Georgia State.

The forward also notched 13 boards on Nov. 7, 2022 against Earlham at Worthen Arena.

PRODUCTION IN BALL STATE DEBUT: Jermahri Hill (17 points, six rebounds), Ethan Brittain-Watts (12 points) and Juanse Gorosito (12) were the top three scorers for the Cardinals on Monday night, with each playing in their first official games at Ball State.

Brittain-Watts transferred in from Boston prior to the 2023-24 season but had to sit out last year due to injury, while Hill (South Plains JC) and Gorosito (Portland) are guards who joined the team over the summer.

CARDINALS SOAR AT THE LINE: Ball State led the MAC and ranked 27th nationally in free throw percentage (76.7) last season, which was the best mark in program history, while getting to the line at a 21.5 free throw attempts per game clip which was second in the MAC.

Those numbers should be bolstered by the addition of Hernandez, who was prolific at both getting to the line and making free throws last season. The graduate student made the 13th-most free throws (200) in the country while attempting the 14th-most (247) for an 81.0 average.

BROUGHT THE SPARKS BACK: Cardinals' fans are happy to welcome back senior center Payton Sparks, who was the 2022 MAC Freshman of the Year and Second Team All-MAC in 2022 and 2023 before transferring to Indiana.

Sparks enters the season with 880 career points and 576 career rebounds and ranks No. 25 in Ball State history with 532 rebounds as a Cardinal.

HOME STATE HEROES: Brittain-Watts (2019), Zane Doughty, Joey Hart and Jones (2023) were each named Indiana High School All-Stars, while three more Cardinals also had ties to the state before arriving in Muncie.

Ball State has the second-most players from Indiana high schools among Indiana-based Division I teams behind Purdue.

WORLD FLYERS: The 2024-25 Ball State roster consists of student-athletes from three different countries in addition to the United States of America.

Gorosito (Argentina), Hendriks (Canada) and Jurica Zagorsak (Croatia) are international Cardinals this season. Interestingly, Juanse, Ben and Jurica were born on different continents, so Ball State has student-athletes from North America, South America and Europe on the team.

BIG MEN CAUSE BIG PROBLEMS: Sparks (6-foot-10), Hendriks (6-foot-10) and Doughty (6-foot-9) are each north of 240 pounds to provide a physical interior presence for Ball State this season.

Joining the trio in the frontcourt at 6-foot-7 or taller are Jones, Zagorsak and Pearson Jr.

TRANSFERS FROM ALL OVER: Each of Ball State's seven student-athletes who have transferred into the program have come from different college basketball conferences.

The list includes Brittain-Watts (Patriot League, Boston), Gorosito (West Coast Conference, Portland), Hart (SEC, Kentucky), Hernandez (Ohio Valley Conference, USI), Pearson Jr. (Big 12, TCU), Sparks (Big Ten, Indiana) and Hill who played junior college ball at South Plains in Levelland, Texas.

Men's Basketball Hosting Franklin College Friday for Home Opener

Next Event

Players Mentioned

Ethan Brittain-Watts

Zane Doughty

Juanse Gorosito

Joey Hart

Ben Hendriks

Jeremiah Hernandez

Jermahri Hill

Mason Jones

Mickey Pearson Jr.

Payton Sparks

Jurica Zagorsak