Game Notes

EVANSVILLE, Ind. – After wrapping up its second-best regular season since entering the Missouri Valley Conference, the University of Evansville men’s basketball team will look to capitalize on that momentum beginning on Friday in the MVC Tournament.
 
The third-seeded Aces will take on No. 6 seed Missouri State at 8:30 p.m. on Friday evening at Scottrade Center.  The game will be carried live on the MVC Network while 91.5 WUEV and www.WUEV.org will carry the broadcast.
 
One shot was all it took to make the difference between placing third and eighth in the MVC.  With one second remaining against Missouri State, Denver Holmes connected on a three that sent the game into overtime as the Aces would eventually win.  Had he not made that shot, UE would have been the No. 8 seed in the tournament.  Ned Cox led Evansville with 17 points as UE played its record sixth OT game of the season and second against Missouri State.  Jarmar Gulley led MSU with 20 points.  Evansville overcame a 10-point deficit in the second half to notch the victory.
 
Junior Colt Ryan became just the fifth player to be named to the MVC All-Conference First Team and the first to garner the honor since Shy Ely did so in 2009 (Marcus Wilson was named on two occasions).  Ryan led UE and was second in the MVC, averaging 20.5 points per game while tying for the league lead in steals, swiping two a game.  The three-time MVC Player of the Week scored a career-high 43 points last week against Creighton before tallying 12 in Saturday’s win over Missouri State.  Ryan was also named to the CollegeHoops.net All-MVC Team.
 
Denver Holmes has come on strong in his final weeks with the Aces.  In the home win over Northern Iowa, Holmes hit a pair of threes in the final 19 seconds to give UE the win.  He followed that up with a career-high 25 points at Creighton where he was 8-9 and 4-5 from three-point range.  In the regular season finale against Missouri State, he was clutch once again.  With just one second remaining in regulation, he connected on a trey to send the game to OT before UE hung on for the win.  He is the leading free throw shooter in the MVC (88.9%) and UE’s No. 2 scorer.  For his efforts, the Olathe, Kan. native was named All-Conference Honorable Mention.
 
Coming off the bench can be a tough task, but don’t tell that to junior Ned Cox, who showed that the role suits him better than anyone else in the MVC.  It is that attitude that helped Cox earn Sixth Man of the Year honors.  After averaging 7.3 PPG a season ago, Cox saw his average rise by two points.  He has ten double-digit scoring efforts, led by a pair of 20-point outings.  In a November contest at Illinois Chicago, he set his career mark with 24 points as he hit 9-of-13 shots.  He followed that up with a 22-point performance at Indiana State where he was a perfect 4-4 from long range.  Cox made two starts for the Aces, scoring 16 points against Oakland City before leading Evansville with 17 points in a start in the regular season finale against Missouri State.  He is the second Aces to be honored with the award; Curt Begle picked up the award in 1999.
 
One of the pleasant surprises for Evansville this season was junior Troy Taylor.  The point guard, and the leading rebounder for UE, was named to the All-Defensive Team.  Taylor leads the Aces with 4.8 rebounds per game while contributing in other facets as well, notching 99 assists, 42 steals and 5.4 PPG.  Taylor has made two stabs at just the second triple-double in Evansville history, most recently in the home game against Indiana State.  He fell just two assists and a point short of accomplishing the feat.  He is one of just three players to receive the honor for the Aces.  Jeremy Stanton was named to the team each season from 1999-2001 while Reed Jackson notched the award in 1995.
 
In its first 17 seasons in the Valley, the Aces have played 21 tournament games, falling in 17 of those contests, including the last six games.  UE’s last win came in 2006 against Illinois State.  Evansville has faced Missouri State four times, more than any other opponent in the league and has lost all four games.
 
Making the All-Freshman Team was Ryan Sawvell.  He got better as the season went on, scoring 10 or more points in a span of seven out of 11 contests in January and February.  Sawvell’s top scoring game came against Drake where he knocked down seven shots to score 14 points.  In UE’s win at Bradley, Sawvell hauled in 16 rebounds, the most a UE player has had this season.  He has been an extremely accurate shooter, hitting 62.2% of his attempts, a tally that would be sixth in the nation with enough tries.  Sawvell is the 10th UE player to be named an All-Freshman player.
 
Since his arrival at UE in 2007, head coach Marty Simmons has steadily turned the program around.  In three of the last four years, Simmons has finished in the top six in the league after the program had done so just once in the eight seasons before 2009.  His squads have shown vast improvement against top competition, winning three of his last four games versus ranked opponents.  Prior to that streak, Evansville had fallen in ten-consecutive games against top-25 squads.  With a 15-14 regular season mark in 2011-12, Simmons helped UE to its first back-to-back winning regular seasons since 1998-99 through 1999-2000.
 
Missouri State enters the MVC Tournament having dropped its last four games, most recently a 75-70 overtime game at Evansville.  Last year’s MVC Player of the Year Kyle Weems has averaged 15.4 PPG to lead the Bears while three others have also averaged double figures.  Weems scored 13 points in last week’s game, but led MSU with 17 points in the first meeting this year against UE.