The University of Arkansas at Little Rock men's basketball team has lost seven of its past eight games, and begins the Sun Belt Conference Tournament tonight as the West Division No. 5 seed, having fallen well below the expectations set out for the preseason conference favorites.
Even so, Coach Darrell Walker and the Trojans -- who earned the 2019-20 Sun Belt regular-season title before covid-19 canceled the postseason last March -- are arriving at the league tournament in Pensacola, Fla., with a champion's mentality.
"We're still the defending Sun Belt Conference champions," Walker said. "We're the defending champions. I'm not being cocky about that -- we are. And we have some unfinished business."
UALR (11-14, 7-11 Sun Belt) opens its "title defense" against East Division No. 4 seed Appalachian State (13-11, 7-8) at 7:30 tonight at Pensacola State's Hartsell Arena. The winner will advance to play West Division winner Texas State at 8 p.m. Saturday.
Arkansas State University Coach Mike Balado also has brought with him a positive mindset after the Red Wolves' dropped three consecutive games to close the regular season.
"There's no panic mode," the fourth-year coach said of his team's recent struggles.
ASU (10-12, 7-8), the West Division No. 4 seed, tips off with East Division No. 5 seed Georgia Southern (13-12, 7-9) at 5 p.m. at Hartsell Arena, with a chance to play East Division No. 1 seed Georgia State in the second round at 5:30 p.m. Saturday.
Only 358 days ago, the Trojans held a place in the conference's semifinals before the tournament was ultimately canceled. The UALR team that won 15 Sun Belt games in 2019-20 feels distant in March 2021.
These Trojans began bright with a 3-1 start in the Sun Belt, but faded to .500 in late January before losing their first seven games of February, as the offense that finished fourth in Sun Belt scoring a year ago closed the regular season averaging 69.0 points per game (No. 9 Sun Belt) and shooting 31.2% from three-point range (No. 10). Missing the same scoring punch from a year ago, Walker expects his Trojans to at least embody the same attitude in Pensacola.
"At the conference tournament, we're the defending champions," Walker said. "For right now, we won it. This season still isn't over yet. We've got to go there and play like it."
The Mountaineers come with the second-best scoring defense (64.1 ppg) in the Sun Belt, anchored by seniors Justin Forrest and Michael Almonacy on the perimeter. UALR will stick with its standard inside-out offense, operating through junior Nikola Maric, who leads the Trojans with 14.4 points per game, and senior Ruot Monyyong.
But as it has all season, the UALR offense will depend on outside scorers such as senior Ben Coupet Jr. (10.0 ppg), and the production the Trojans get from their perimeter offense.
"When we score the ball and we guard like we've been doing for the last month and a half, we're a very dangerous basketball team," Walker said. "I don't care who we play."
The Red Wolves, meanwhile, enter the tournament following a sweep Texas-Arlington and in the midst of a three-game losing streak. ASU shot below its 37.9% three-point shooting average (No. 2 in the Sun Belt) twice over the final three games of the regular season beginning with an 0-13 performance against Texas State on Feb. 22, and has cracked 70 points only once in those contests.
In the spite of the recent woes, Balado remains unfazed.
"It's not anything that we have to change drastically," he said. "Do we have to make adjustments? Sure. But I think our system and our approach and staying the course has been very very good."
Balado and the Red Wolves are using familiarity -- and the coaching tree of former UALR coach Chris Beard -- to prepare for the unorthodox conference tournament, in which every first round matchup features teams from the opposite side of the conference and have yet to play each other this season.
Georgia Southern Brian Burg was previously an assistant under Beard with the Trojans, and later served under him at Texas Tech. So did Texas-Arlington Coach Chris Ogden. And while ASU hasn't faced the Eagles yet in 2020-21, they've played Ogden's Mavericks and their offense four times.
"They're very similar to UT-A," Balado said. "So we've kind of seen a little bit, offensively at least, a very similar motion offense.
"There's always the unknown going into a tournament when you haven't seen a team and you haven't played them all year. But the similarities they have with another team we played, we can use comparisons to those games."
At a glance
TODAY'S SBC TOURNAMENT GAMES
at Pensacola, Fla.
Men's first round
At Pensacola State College
Arkansas St. vs. Ga. Southern, 4 p.m.
Appalachian St. vs. UALR, 6:30 p.m.
At Pensacola Bay Center
S. Alabama vs. La.-Monroe, 4:30 p.m.
Texas-Arlington vs. Troy, 7 p.m.
Women's first round
At Pensacola State College
Texas St. vs Ga. Southern, 10:30 a.m.
S. Alabama vs. Arkansas St., 1 p.m.
At Pensacola Bay Center
Appalachian St. vs. La.-Monroe, 10 a.m.
UALR vs. Coastal Carolina, 12:30 p.m.
