Harding men\u2019s basketball opens its season Friday night against the University of Central Missouri in the Central Region Tipoff Classic in Warrensburg, Mo. Harding looks to be more successful this year than it was a season ago, when the Bisons garnered their worst record since joining the Great American Conference (GAC) in 2011.<\/p>\n
The Bisons went 5-17 in GAC play last year, the second worst record in the conference. According to Harding Head Men\u2019s Basketball Coach Jeff Morgan, the team has made a point of putting last season\u2019s failures behind them.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe learned a lot of great lessons going through it,\u201d Morgan said. \u201cYou have seasons in your life that don’t go well, and that season doesn’t define your life, just like a season doesn’t define our program.\u201d<\/p>\n
That is especially true of the Bisons this season. The team returns only two seniors and one player who has played all four years. Morgan said the youth offers his team the chance to grow this season.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think it is going to be a team that I think will continue to get better as the year goes on,\u201d Morgan said. \u201cWe\u2019ve got six new guys and four that did not play last year [because of injuries], so we basically have a new team.\u201d<\/p>\n
Senior guard Reggie Anthony started 26 games last season and was third in scoring with 9.5 points per game. This season, Anthony has become one of the team\u2019s leaders. In spite of the high turnover of players, he said he is confident in the team\u2019s chemistry.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s probably the most fun I have had with a team so far,\u201d Anthony said. \u201cI am excited to see how that translates to the court.\u201d<\/p>\n
One of the new faces on this year\u2019s team is graduate transfer JV Long. Long played 91 games in three years at Cameron University in Oklahoma before coming to Harding to be a part of its physician\u2019s assistant graduate program. Long plays point guard and averaged more than 10 points a game last year.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt’s been easy to fit in and just get really comfortable with these guys,\u201d Long said. \u201cI’m just ready to get back out there with all of these guys and show everybody what I\u2019m going to do.\u201d<\/p>\n
According to Morgan, one major difference between this season and last is the defensive intensity he believes his team will show.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think we have got some guys that can be good disruptors on the defensive end,\u201d Morgan said. \u201cHopefully that will lead us to get some easier shots on the offensive end.\u201d<\/p>\n
Morgan said one reason he expects the team to excel defensively is its speed. Compared to previous years, when the team has focused on slower play and strong shooting, he said this team will be more up-tempo, which he has already seen in the team\u2019s practices this offseason.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have a sign that says competitive family, and it kind of sums up practice,\u201d Anthony said. \u201cWe get after each other.\u201d<\/p>\n
Harding is projected to finish 10th in the GAC, according to the GAC preseason poll, but that has not kept the Bisons from dreaming big.<\/p>\n
\u201c[Our goal is] to take it one game at a time,\u201d sophomore guard Alex Francis said. \u201cAs we do that, we build towards that conference championship.\u201d<\/p>\n
The new-look Bisons squad will have their first test this weekend against two traditional Division II powerhouses, the University of Central Missouri and Pittsburg State University.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am very excited,\u201d Francis said. \u201cLast year just kind of left a bad taste in your mouth, and it seems like it’s been forever since we stopped playing.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Harding men\u2019s basketball opens its season Friday night against the University of Central Missouri in the Central Region Tipoff Classic in Warrensburg, Mo. Harding looks to be more successful this…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15110,"featured_media":11984,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[149,574,404,575],"class_list":["post-11983","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","tag-bisons","tag-central-region-tipoff-classic","tag-mens-basketball","tag-university-of-central-missouri"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelink.harding.edu\/the-bison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11983","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelink.harding.edu\/the-bison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelink.harding.edu\/the-bison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelink.harding.edu\/the-bison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15110"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelink.harding.edu\/the-bison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11983"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thelink.harding.edu\/the-bison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11983\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11985,"href":"https:\/\/thelink.harding.edu\/the-bison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11983\/revisions\/11985"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelink.harding.edu\/the-bison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11984"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelink.harding.edu\/the-bison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11983"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelink.harding.edu\/the-bison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11983"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelink.harding.edu\/the-bison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11983"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}