PORTALES, N.M. – Eastern New Mexico men's basketball enters the last week of the regular season with a pair of games against Western New Mexico. The two programs will square off Monday night at 7:30 p.m. inside Greyhound Arena and then the two will faceoff in Silver City to close out Lone Star Conference play. Before the Mustangs get into town, please take a look at the Starting Five:
1.) Road Sweep: Before this weekend, Eastern had just two wins away from home. That all of a sudden doubled as ENMU picked up two wins over Oklahoma Christian and University of Arkansas Fort Smith. Against OC, the Hounds took a 21-point (79-58) victory. A high-powered Eastern offense challenged the Lions, 71-63, and clinched the opportunity to compete in the Lone Star Conference basketball championship.
2.) Series History: ENMU is 58-48 all-time against Western New Mexico. The two teams met last season in Portales and the greyhounds came away with an 87-64 victory. Eight of the last eleven contests have gone in favor of Eastern. The Hounds hold a 32-15 advantage inside Greyhound Arena and the largest margin of victory over the Mustangs came in a 52-15 win in 1937.
3.) Happy Stats: The Greyhounds rank atop the Lone Star Conference in four statistical categories. Those include: field goal percentage defense (41.3%), rebound margin (4.6), rebounds per game (37.15), and turnovers forced per game (16.62). Individually,
Errol White leads the league with 8.8 rebounds per game.
4.) Senior Sendoff: Two seniors will be honored before tip of the game Monday night.
Eze Dike and
Grehlon Easter are both graduate transfers who have played a major impact for ENMU during the 2022-23 season. Dike is the team's fourth leading scorer averaging 10.4 points per contest. He has connected on a team-best 33 three-pointers and has dished out 40 assists this season. He plans on pursuing a professional career after his time in Portales. Easter is the fifth leading scorer with 9.1 points per game. He has 15 steals this season and has helped ENMU improve its win total by ten victories compared to 2021-22.
5.) Playoff Picture: In the final week of the regular season, ENMU can climb to as high as tied for third in the LSC standings. The worst finish for the Hounds would be tied for seventh, which means the team qualifies for the 2023 conference postseason tournament. Going into the final week, the top spots are still up for grabs as St. Edward's and Texas A&M-Kingsville battle for the East Division and West Texas A&M and Angelo State go toe-to-toe for the West Division.
Tonight's game will be live streamed on the Lone Star Conference Digital Network.
