SAN ANTONIO – UTSA men's basketball opens its 38th season of play on Wednesday as hosts to St. Edward's University. Tipoff is set for 7 p.m. inside the Convocation Center.
UTSA Roadrunners (0-0)
vs.
St. Edward's Hilltoppers (0-0)
7 p.m. | Nov. 7, 2018
Convocation Center (2,650) | San Antonio, Texas
Web stream: CUSA.tv
Radio: Ticket 760 AM
Headlines and storylines
• UTSA opens its 38th season of basketball on Wednesday. The Roadrunners are 546-544 (.501) all-time, which includes four NCAA Tournament appearances.
• Reigning Conference USA Gene Bartow Coach of the Year Steve Henson is in third year at the helm of the Roadrunners. Henson is 34-34 overall at UTSA with 19-17 conference record.
• UTSA is 23-7 at home in the Convocation Center over the past two seasons.
• The Roadrunners and St. Edward's are meeting on the hardwood for the first time.
• UTSA returns four starters from its 2017-18 20-win campaign, including junior point guard Giovanni De Nicolao, sophomore shooting guard Jhivvan Jackson, junior small forward Byron Frohnen and senior power forward Nick Allen. Sophomore point/shooting Keaton Wallace, who started 19 games as a freshman, also returns to bring UTSA's experience to 234 combined career starts.
• The Roadrunners' 2018-19 schedule includes 15 home games, highlighted by visits from Oklahoma and Texas State. The road slate includes games against Oklahoma State, Arkansas and the Gulf Coast Showcase.
• UTSA was selected fifth in the Conference USA Preseason Poll, as voted by the league's head coaches.
Game overview
• UTSA hosts St. Edward's in the 2018-19 season opener on Wednesday at 7 p.m. The game will air on the Roadrunners Sports Network (Ticket 760 AM in San Antonio) with Andy Everett providing play-by-play and Tim Carter serving as analyst. The game will also be web streamed on CUSA.tv.
Series history vs. St. Edward's
• UTSA and St. Edward's are meeting on the hardwood for the first time.
UTSA opens 2018-19 campaign
• UTSA officially opens the 2018-19 campaign Wednesday against St. Edward's.
• The campaign marks the 38th season of UTSA Roadrunners basketball. The program is 546-544 (.501) overall with four NCAA Tournament appearances.
• UTSA also has a CollegeInsider.com Postseason Tournament (CIT) on its resume, going 1-1 in the event last season.
UTSA in season lid-lifters
• UTSA is 23-14 all-time in season openers but has dropped four of its last six openers. The Roadrunners will open the campaign with a home game for the second straight season (UTSA defeated East Central 92-59 last season). Overall, this marks the 22nd Roadrunner season-opener played at the Convocation Center with UTSA holding an 19-2 record in such games. UTSA's two losses came in the 1983-84 opener to Presbyterian College (55-54) and 2013-14 opener to Northern Arizona (74-63).
Third season of the Steve Henson era
• The 2018-19 season marks the third season of the Steven Henson era at UTSA. Henson, who came to UTSA from Lon Kruger's staff at Oklahoma, has guided the Roadrunners to a 34-34 overall mark in his two seasons at the helm. Under Henson's tutelage, UTSA won a program-best 11 Conference USA contests last season and picked up UTSA's second consecutive Conference USA tournament win. Moreover, Henson coached Jhivvan Jackson to C-USA Freshman of the Year and Deon Lyle to league Sixth Player of the Year plaudits in 2017-18.
Defending home court
• In the two seasons under head coach Steve Henson, UTSA has posted a 23-7 record at the Convocation Center. The Roadrunners went 11-3 at home last season and 12-4 in 2017-18.
• Prior to these two seasons, UTSA last posted consecutive 11-win home seasons when the program went 11-3 in 2008-09, 2009-10 and 2010-11 as members of the Southland Conference.
• The 1991-92 team was the last Roadrunners squad to win more than 12 games at the Convocation Center, finishing 14-1.
Seven new Birds
• Seven newcomers will don the UTSA Blue and Orange for the first time in 2018-19, including four freshmen, a sophomore and two transfers.
• The freshmen class is composed of Texas high school products Tamir Bynum (Lamar HS), Mateo Escheik (Prestonwood Christian Academy) and Austin Timperman (The Woodlands HS), along with Oklahoman Adokiye Iyaye (Oklahoma City/Putnam North HS).
• Sophomore Christian Plummer joined the team as walk-on out of Coppell HS.
• Junior college transfer forward Atem Bior (New Mexico Military Institute) is joined by four-year transfer Knox Hellums (Pepperdine) as newcomers to the junior class. Hellums is required to sit out the 2018-19 season due to NCAA transfer policies.
Jackson progressing, on pace for December return
• Reigning Conference USA Freshman of the Year and second-team all-conference selection Jhivvan Jackson is on pace for an early December return to the court from a knee injury that cost him the final six game of his rookie season.
• Despite the injury, Jackson set the UTSA freshman scoring record with 534 points and led the team with 18.4 per game. He shot 43.1 percent from the field for the season and tallied three 30-point, 14 20-point and 25 double-figure scoring performances.
Rodriguez ready for return to floor
• After suffering a season-ending knee injury in last season's opener, redshirt freshman Adrian Rodriguez is medically cleared for the 2018-19 season.
•Before suffering the injury, the 6-foot-7 forward from Tulsa, Okla., scored 10 points and grabbed eight rebounds in 14 minutes off the bench against East Central.
Henson awarded contract extension
• The University of Texas System Board of Regents approved on May 1 a contract extension for UTSA head men's basketball coach Steve Henson that will run through the 2023-24 season.
• The contract extends Henson's original deal an additional three seasons and raises his base salary from $280,000 to $325,000 per year.
69 straight starts
• Juniors Byron Frohnen and Giovanni De Nicolao are projected to make their 69th consecutive starts on Wednesday against St. Edward's. The first two signees of head coach Steve Henson in spring 2016 have started all 68 game of their careers. Frohnen has started at both the small and power forward positions, while De Nicolao has been the stalwart at point guard.
3-Point record in 2017-18
• After making just 172 3-pointers all of 2016-17, the 2017-18 Roadrunners set the UTSA single-season team 3-point field goals made record with 353. The previous record was 272 by the 2011-12 squad.
• The Roadrunners' 10.1 triples per game led Conference USA and ranked 19th in the NCAA.
• UTSA's 353 makes this season ranked fifth on the Conference USA single season list. The conference record is 375 by the 2007-08 Houston Cougars.
• Deon Lyle (who elected to depart the program to pursue a professional career in the Junior Basketball Association after his junior season), Jhivvan Jackson and Keaton Wallace lead the Roadrunners from deep with 956, 77 and 74 made triples, respectively. Junior point guard Giovanni De Nicolao made 36 and senior big man Nick Allen stepped out to hit 33 threes, which was 13 more than his first two seasons combined.
738 straight with a trey
• UTSA has made at least one 3-point field goal in each of its last 738 consecutive games, which ranks as the 21st longest streak in the nation. The last time the Roadrunners failed to connect from long range come on Jan. 5, 1994 in a 91-69 loss vs. Texas (0 of 6). To put the time frame in perspective: Bill Clinton had not yet completed his first full year as POTUS, Hero by Mariah Carey was on top of the Billboard Hot 100 chart, Mrs. Doubtfire was the No. 1 movie in the box office and the Dallas Cowboys were 15 days from winning Super Bowl XXVIII, 30-13, over the Buffalo Bills.
Frohnen on the boards
• Junior forward Byron Frohnen leads UTSA and ranked eighth in Conference USA with a per game average of 7.3 rebounds. in 2017-18.
• Frohnen's 474 rebounds in only 68 career games is ninth on the UTSA career list. He needs 43 more to supplant Reggie Minnieweather (517 in 113 games from 1998-02) for eighth.
The schedule
• UTSA will play 13 non-conference games, highlighted by matchups against Oklahoma, Oklahoma State and Arkansas and three games at the Gulf Coast Showcase. In addition, the Roadrunners will face I-35 rival Texas State at home along with trips Texas A&M-Corpus Christi and Houston Baptist. Also included in the 13-game non-conference schedule are games against St. Edward's, Mid-America Christian, Bethany and Southeastern Oklahoma State.
• The Roadrunners open their 18-game Conference USA slate on Thurs., Jan. 3 against in-state rival UTEP. The Roadrunners will play 13 additional C-USA games before the innovative bonus play schedule is implemented for the final four games of the conference season.
• The 2019 Conference USA Championship will again be held at the Ford Center at The Star in Frisco, Texas. The tournament commences on March 13 with the championship game taking place on March 16.
Up Next
• UTSA hosts the University of Oklahoma Sooners on Monday, November 12. The game, which is set for a 7 p.m. tipoff, will be televised nationwide on CBS Sports Network.
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