SAN ANTONIO – The UTSA men's basketball team has secured the No. 4 seed in the Western Division and will face No. 5 seeded Charlotte in the second round of the Conference USA Championships on Wednesday at 5:30 p.m. at the Ford Center at The Star in Frisco, Texas. The game will be broadcast live on ESPN+ and Ticket 760 AM.
UTSA (14-10) earned the No. 4 seed in the West and will face the No. 5 seed from the East. It marks the first meeting between the two teams, as UTSA's scheduled trip to the Queen City on Feb. 19-20 was cancelled after a winter storm hit Texas, halting air travel and impacting power and water supplies.
Charlotte (9-15, 5-11 C-USA) comes into the matchup with UTSA having lost eight straight games, with its last win coming on Jan. 30 vs. FIU in Charlotte. During the 49ers losing streak, Charlotte has lost at Middle Tennessee, vs. Old Dominion, at UTEP and over the weekend at Marshall.
The teams last faced off in 2019-20 in Charlotte, where the 49ers got a 26-point performance from Jordan Shepherd, who made 5 of 7 3-pointers despite entering the game as a 26.1 percent shooter from the arc, in the win. UTSA was just 8 of 31 from 3-point range, while Charlotte shot 51.9 percent, making 26 of 38 free throws. UTSA had 27 points from Keaton Wallace and 25 points from Jhivvan Jackson in the loss, with Jackson held to a 1 of 11 mark from distance.
The Roadrunners will be in search of their fourth all-time conference tournament championship and their first since claiming the 2010-11 Southland Conference crown. UTSA won the Southland in 2004 and 1999, and the TransAmerica Athletic Conference in 1988. UTSA owns a 2-7 all-time record in the C-USA Championships, appearing in the tournament in each season since joining the circuit in 2013-14.
UTSA's best run in the C-USA Championships came with a pair of wins in the 2016-17 and 2017-18 tournaments. UTSA has never faced Charlotte in the C-USA Championships. UTSA is 26-26 all-time in conference tournaments.
The blistering hot Roadrunners enter the conference tournament having won nine of their last 11 games. After opening the year with a 1-5 league record and a 4-6 record overall, UTSA ripped off four and three-game win streaks. UTSA played a non-conference game on Thursday as the Roadrunners were in search of a contest that could break up a stretch of just two games scheduled in 24 days entering the postseason. UTSA posted an 80-point win over Southwestern Adventist in its regular-season finale, six days after a 96-79 rout of UAB on Feb. 27.
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