SAN ANTONIO – The UTSA men's basketball team will hit the road for the finale of a season-long, three-game road swing, traveling to face UTEP in El Paso on Thursday at 8 p.m. CT at the Don Haskins Center. The game will be broadcast live on CUSA TV and Ticket 760 AM, with the Voice of the Roadrunners, Andy Everett, calling the action.
UTSA (7-11, 0-5 Conference USA) will conclude its season-long road swing with the matchup at UTEP and will then host the Miners in the final of the travel-partner week, welcoming UTEP on Sunday at 3 p.m. in the Convocation Center.
The Roadrunners are coming off a pair of losses over the weekend on the East Coast, falling to Old Dominion on Thursday in Norfolk, Va., before venturing to Charlotte, where the 49ers posted a nine-point win.
UTSA has averaged 67.6 points, 40.4 rebounds, 10.9 assists, 5.8 steals and 2.8 blocks per game as a team, shooting 38.1 percent from the field and 27.7 percent from 3-point range. Opponents are shooting 45 percent as a team and 35.3 percent from distance.
The Roadrunners are led in scoring by sophomore guard Jordan Ivy-Curry, a native of La Marque, Texas, who earned Freshman All-Conference USA honors last year. Ivy-Curry averages 15.1 points and 2.6 rebounds per game, while shooting 39.3 percent from 3-point range. Junior center Jacob Germany averages 13.7 points and 6.5 rebounds per game. Senior guard Darius McNeill chips in 4.9 points and 2.0 rebounds per game, while freshman guard Christian Tucker sports 4.3 points and 1.9 rebounds per game.
UTEP (9-8, 2-3 C-USA) comes into the matchup with the Roadrunners fresh off a thrilling 78-70 overtime win at Old Dominion on Saturday in Norfolk. The Miners have won two of their last three games, including a 33 point win over Southern Miss, which snapped a three-game losing streak that included league setbacks vs. UAB and Louisiana Tech.
The Miners are under the direction of first-year head coach Joe Golding, who took over the program after leading Abilene Christian to a historic run in the NCAA Tournament in 2020-21 that included a 24-win season, a Southland Conference Championship and an upset win over Texas in the Big Dance.
UTEP averages 68.9 points, 33.3 rebounds, 11.8 assists, 8.1 steals and 3.3 blocks per game as a team, shooting 41 percent from the field and 33.9 percent from range. Opponents are shooting 43.6 percent as a team and 32.7 percent from 3-point distance.
San Francisco transfer Souley Boum paces the Miners with 18.9 points and 3.9 rebounds per game. Jamal Bieniemy, a transfer from Oklahoma, averages 14.6 points and 2.7 rebounds per game. Xavier transfer Keonte Kennedy averages 13.3 points and 5.9 rebounds per game. Junior college transfer Jorell Saterfield sports 7.9 points and 2.2 rebounds per game.
UTEP leads the all-time series with UTSA, 12-10, including a 9-3 mark in games played in El Paso. The Roadrunners have won seven of the last nine meetings in the series and split the two-game set in 2020-21, with each home team winning for the second consecutive year. UTSA last won in El Paso in 2019, a 67-63 result in the Don Haskins Center. In the last meeting in 2020-21, UTEP posted a 69-51 win over the Roadrunners, breaking open a three-point game at halftime with a 15-point advantage in the final period. Souley Boum led UTEP with 20 points, while Bryson Williams – now starring for Texas Tech – had seven points and nine rebounds. Jamal Bieniemy had 16 points and 10 rebounds for the Miners, who shot 44.6 percent from the field and was 16 of 18 from the line. UTSA was held to 29.5 percent from the field, going 2 of 17 from deep. Keaton Wallace had 16 points, while Jacob Germany chipped in 11 points and five rebounds. Jhivvan Jackson finished with seven points and three boards in 25 minutes.
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