The UALR men's basketball team returned home from an eight-day road trip that might have turned some heads regarding first-year coach Chris Beard's team, but not his.
Three consecutive victories -- at San Diego State, vs. East Carolina in Las Vegas and at Tulsa -- have put the Trojans on the cusp of their best start ever and have earned them two points in this weeks' Associated Press Top 25 poll and put them at Nos. 1 and 3 nationally in two early season ratings percentage index projections.
Beard said the 5-0 start is nice, but it hasn't changed his mind-set much as UALR returns home to host Central Arkansas (1-4) at 7 tonight.
"We're still a work in progress," Beard said. "Our objective continues to be to try to get better every day, whether that's in practice or in games. We played better against Tulsa than we did against San Diego State, so I like the direction we're headed."
That's not to say Beard isn't enjoying the Trojans' start,and said he made a point Monday to glance at the new AP Top 25 poll in which his Trojans earned two points -- one voter ranked them 24th. It is believed to be the first time UALR earned points in a national poll since the Mike Newell era ended in 1990.
An RPI projection compiled by Yahoo! Sports had UALR ranked No. 1 on Sunday and a similar projection done by ESPN.com had it No. 3. Beard said he normally ignores accolades so early in the season, but is making an exception this time.
"Anything that brings attention to our athletic department, I'm all for," he said. "Probably for the first time in my career I'm embracing this a little bit more than I usually do, because I think it's a great thing for Little Rock basketball."
Defense has been a big factor.
The Trojans are holding teams to a Division I-low 51.0 points per game, rank seventh nationally in field-goal percentage defense (34.0 percent) and are 19th with a plus-5.6 turnover margin.
The Trojans held San Diego State to 39 points below its to-that-point average in a 49-43 victory on Nov. 21, and Tulsa to 21 points below what it had been scoring in Saturday's 64-60 victory. The Trojans also held Tulsa's leading scorer, Shaquille Harrison who had been averaging 23.4 points, to 4 points on 0-for-4 shooting.
"Every day we start with a defensive drill and we finish practice with a defensive drill," guard Marcus Johnson Jr. said. "That's been our motto: Defense, defense defense."
Beard said he's not surprised in the speed with which his first team has grasped his defensive concepts, and that it's rooted in a mind-set he tried to instill when he first arrived.
"Probably the most pleasing thing has been that everyone has bought into how we're trying to play," Beard said. "You're either going to do it or you're not. You're either going to be on the train or your not."
Beard said just about everyone is on board. So much so, he's not even concerned how the Trojans are playing offensively.
UALR is averaging 67.6 points per game and shooting 40.9 percent form the field, but Beard is most pleased with how the Trojans are taking care of the ball. UALR didn't commit a turnover in the first half against San Diego State or the second half against East Carolina and are averaging 7.2 turnovers per game.
Add it up, and the Trojans are closing in on the program's best start.
"It's new for us, but we're really enjoying it," senior guard Josh Hagins said. "We're not ignoring the fact that we're 5-0, we're embracing it. A lot of people are trying to talk about the end of the road, but we're enjoying the process of getting there."
Sports on 12/01/2015