Evansville vs. San Francisco Preview
By Mark Kramer
USF Dons (3-1) vs. Evansville Purple Aces (3-1)
Date and Time: Wednesday, November 26, 2014 at 3:00 PST
Location: Third Place Game of the Gulf Coast Showcase, Germain Arena, Estero, FL
Video: http://www.americaonesports.com/atlanticsun.asp
Audio: http://new.livestream.com/thewtv/USFmbbaudioonly
Meet the Teams
San Francisco
Suffering their first loss of the season against Florida Gulf Coast University Tuesday night, November 25, 2014, FGCU will meet the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay in the tournament’s Championship round rather than the Dons who may be feeling mentally and physically tired. Plenty of time to snooze on the beach after they secure the “bronze” medal of this 3 day tournament by winning their game against Evansville.
Freshman guards Devin Watson and Senior guard Chris Adams saw significant time on the floor during the FGCU game and may well return for more minutes. Same goes for center Derrell Robertson and Montray Clemons. Hopefully Kruize Pinkins will play tighter and avoid the fouls that plagued him in the FGCU game so he can return his essential points to the scoreboard for USF.
Evansville
With a mascot (the Purple Ace) that looks like the cousin of the University of Portland’s Wally the Riverboat Pilot (same school colors too) this Missouri River Valley conference team competes against Wichita State on a regular basis, so they are battle tested. Playing two very close games in this tournament winning by 6 over Fresno State in their opening game and losing to UW-Green Bay by 2 Tuesday night, Evansville is tired too but will undoubtedly rally one more time to leave the tournament winners.
Evansville has a guard heavy lineup with 3 starters at guard DJ Balentine, Duane Gibson and Adam Wing. Blake Simmons plays both guard and forward and Egidijn Mockevicius is the omnipresent center who will be the man in the paint ready for a feed close to the basket. Look for sophomore Mislav Brzoja to come off the bench and contribute heavily. He was the leading scorer for the Purple Aces with 17 points in their game against Fresno State. The Aces have solid basketball experience and have played well in this tournament keeping both games close and exciting. This last game will be no exception.