After a 4-3 start, No. 4 Houston has won 20 of its last 21 matches to regain their season ranking and re-entering the conversation for one of the four top seeds in the NCAA tournament.
With a victory Saturday at home against Cincinnati (17-11, 7-10 Big 12), Cougars (24-4, 16-1) can add his resume and catch his second straight directly conference’s regular seasonal title.
Houston is in rare form as it avenged its Lone League loss on Monday evening with a victory 69-61 at No. 10 Texas Tech. Milos Uzan got a career pile of 22 points to put on Cougars to his seventh straight victory.
However, the win came with a warning, as the short red raiders used only six players. Out of the range were two of Texas Tech’s three best goalkeepers – Chance McMillian and Darrion Williams.
“For us to do what we did tonight was good, but there is also an asterisk,” said Houston coach Kelvin Sampson.
At the same time, Sampson pointed out that Cougars had to play well to win. They used their signature defense to keep the red raiders to 29.8 percent shooting from the floor and 6-of-30-year-old from 3-point range (20 percent).
“It’s not easy to win in this league,” Sampson said of Houston’s 13-game winning line. “It’s hard to win on the road.”
In addition to their delighted defense, Cougar’s second in Division I is ranked 3-point shooting (40.2 percent), led by their backcourt trio by LJ Cryer, Emanuel Sharp and Uzan. Each one has made at least 41.5 percent of their attempts from depth.
This has been a disappointing season for Cincinnati, which was ranked as high as No. 14 in early December and before then. 17 Houston.
After a 10-1 start, Bearcats has struggled in conference games. However, the latest results have been more encouraging with an offensive uptick that helps Bearcats to rebuild its resume in the hope of getting an NCAA tournament in large bid.
When they lost eight of their first 10 league matches, Bearcats averaged 59.4 points. But when they won five of their last seven, they have an average of 76.4.
Cincinnati has reflected the improvement of Jizzle James. After an average of 8.4 points in Bearcat’s first 10 BIG 12 matches, James has scored on a clip of 19.3 during the last seven.
“Jizzle’s kind of finding his trust and rhythm again as an offensive player,” said Cincinnati coach Wes Miller. “When he has the ball in space, we have a lot of confidence in him to go and play.”
The emergence of James, (12.6 points a game) has enabled him to take over the team’s points from Simas Lukosius (11.2), who returned Tuesday in a 69-67 victory over Baylor and got seven points in 17 minutes. The senior of 6 feet-8 was on the page for two matches with a shoulder injury.
A victory at Houston would probably unpack an NCAA quay for Cincinnati, which checks in at No. 47 in the net fabrics.
“What a fantastic opportunity to go there and compete against a team that has already dressed a championship,” Miller said.
Houston has won his last eight matches against Cincinnati but still tracks in the series 13-12.
Bearcats won the first eight meetings.
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