HEATING UP
Sam Houston’s men are turning thing ups after the new year.
When the weather outside is frightful, Sam Houston State is delightful.
The Bearkats enjoyed an eight-game winning streak to start the New Year last season, and they were winners of four straight going into Wednesday’s game against Northwestern State in Huntsville.
The goal now is to stay hot — even as temperatures rise through February and March.
“We’ve got to continue to improve offensively as far as execution,” coach Jason Hooten said. “We can still get more out of a few guys on our team, and we’ll continue to get better as our inside guys get better.”
Tough lesson
That’s one of the key for Sam Houston (10-8, 4-1 Southland Conference) to avoid another meltdown.
After reeling off eight straight wins last January, culminating with the first win over in-state rival Stephen F. Austin since 2011 — snapping a 13-game losing streak against the Lumberjacks — the Bearkats lost six of their final eight Southland games, dropping them from first to fifth.
AFTER ROUGH END TO 2017, RETOOLED SAM HOUSTON STATE SQUAD THRIVING IN NEW YEAR
“We went through a lot of adversity … and a lot of things were going on with our team all year long,” Hooten said. “We had that stretch in there where we won eight in a row, and then we lost a couple of tough ones. And in that stretch, like most teams do, we suffered an injury, to our center (Aurimas Majauskas).
“Then we lost two guys for a game or two with the flu, and it was one of those stretches where we lost a big chunk of our team and we couldn’t pull it together.”
The slide cost them in the Southland tournament.
The Bearkats still opened with wins over Central Arkansas and Houston Baptist, despite Majauskas struggling in his return from a hamstring injury, but they stumbled against eventual champ New Orleans in the semis, falling 75-63, keeping them out of the final for the second straight year.
They haven’t won the Southland tournament championship since 2010.
“I still think to this day if we hadn’t had to play four games in four days, we could have won that thing,” Hooten said.
New core group
That’s the goal again this season, despite graduating Majauskas, leading scorer Dakarai Henderson, Torry Butler and Paul Baxter, all starters for last year’s squad that finished with a 21-13, 10-8 record.
Hooten compares this team to the 2015-16 squad that finished a rebuild at 18-16, 12-6.
“It’s a different group, a different nucleus,” he said.
“The great thing for our team is there are some guys who played minutes last year, and we’ve got some highcharacters guys back.”
The list of returners includes senior forward Chris Galbreath Jr., junior guard John Dewey III, senior guard Jamal Williams, and junior guard Marcus Harris, who sat out last season after transferring from San Diego.
They struggled early with new roles and a grueling schedule.
The 2017 portion of the slate included three straight losses in November, and then five setbacks in six games in December, with losses at Baylor, Ole Miss and LSU, and at home to Utah Valley State.
“That was maybe one of the toughest stretches of schedule that we’ve ever had,” Hooten said.
The year ended with a 7572 loss at Abilene Christian, sending them into 2018 at 6-8 overall and 0-1 in conference.
“Leaving there that night, the guys were extremely disappointed,” Hooten said.
Big bounceback
They were disappointed, but not defeated.
The Bearkats responded by reeling off wins over Central Arkansas (82-76), Incarnate Word (85-74), Texas A&MCorpus Christi (82-50) and Houston Baptist (81-68), lifting them into a three-way tie for third, only a half-game behind New Orleans and one back of Nicholls State (12-8, 6-1).
“We’ve shot the ball better,” Hooten said.
“All year long, we’ve played good defense. We’re top in the country in field-goal defense and points given up. We’re right around 41 (percent) in field-goal defense, and then we’re giving up around 65 points a game. So our biggest deal was, can we score, and a times I wondered how, and who.”
The answers are better health, and a heaping helping of Harris.
Center Josh Boutte, a Dodge City Community College transfer, made his third start last Saturday after missing the first half of the season with an ACL injury, and Harris, who had to shake off the rust after missing a full year, has elevated his scoring from 8.9 points per game to 16.2 in conference.
“(Harris) is an explosive guy,” Hooten said. “He can really score, and he’s shooting the 3 really well in conference. He’s shooting 46 percent from 3, 50 percent from the field … so he’s an explosive scorer.”
Galbreath is the leading scorer (14.6) and rebounder (8.5) overall, Dewey’s supplying 10.1 points and 5.1 assists per game, and Williams, from Episcopal, is the team’s thirdleading scorer in conference (10.6).
“We talk about destinations, and our destinations are obviously to get to the tournament and then hopefully, maybe win the league and go to the NCAA tournament, but those are destinations,” Hooten said.
“Every day, our goal has been just to improve.”