After suffering several close losses away from home this season, the Bisons basketball team, with help from the friendly confines of home, has gotten back on track and found their groove in the last two weeks.
Since classes resumed, the Bisons have not lost a game and have taken full advantage of a timely home stand which coincided with students returning from Christmas break. The combination of a fired up student body and a refreshed team has led to four straight wins in the Rhodes Field House, pulling the Bisons 3-4 Great American Conference (GAC) record up to 7-4 in the last two weeks. They currently sit in fourth place in the GAC standings, one game behind three schools tied for first. Head coach Jeff Morgan said that the Rhodes Rowdies have been a huge part of the last four victories.
“There’s no doubt that the energy and the connection between what’s going on in the stands and what’s going on on the floor is very strong,” Morgan said. “We’ve always known, for 18 years now, that the people in the stands are a huge part of our team. They bring that energy and there’s no doubt that that fuels our guys.”
Another big factor for the Bisons, not just in these last four wins, but all season has been the play of junior center Andraz Kavas. Kavas currently leads the GAC in scoring at 19.8 points per game, which has been bolstered by his last four performances in which he averaged just under 24 points per game and shot nearly 50 percent from behind the three-point line. Kavas said the team knew they had to win these home games.
“We talked before the season about protecting the home court and I think we played really well these last four games,” Kavas said. “We defended really well and were also very effective on offense. We told ourselves, ‘We cannot afford to lose games in front of students, faculty and all the other people who come to our games and support us.'”
The frenzied energy of the Rhodes Rowdies, however, will not be on their side in the coming weeks. Of the Bisons final nine games, six of them are on the road — a place they have yet to win this year.
“When you look at our record on the road, we’ve struggled but it’s not like we’ve played horrible on the road,” Morgan said. “We’ve been in a lot of close games and we just haven’t finished like we’ve needed to. But these guys have a spirit of togetherness, and that’s what you need to have to win on the road.”
In their six road losses this season, five of them were decided by six points or less. Kavas said that although they have struggled away from home this year, the team’s confidence is sky high as they hit the road again, this time carrying a four-game win streak.
“We have struggled in away games this year, but I think that after the last four games the situation is a little bit different,” Kavas said. “We are much more confident and we all believe that it’s about time to steal some wins in away games. If we carry our energy and passion from home games to the road, we have good chances to win those games and put ourselves in the position we all want to be in.”
The Bisons next game is tomorrow at 7:30 p.m. against Southern Arkansas University and will be the final home game until Feb. 14. Results from the Jan. 29 game against Henderson State University were unavailable as of press time.
