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Nevada Hosts Second Place Colorado State Wednesday Night
Feb. 4, 2013 Colorado State at Nevada: Nevada (11-10, 2-5 MW) hosts Colorado State (18-4, 5-2 MW) in a Mountain West game on Wednesday at 7:15 p.m. Nevada sits in seventh place in the MW standings with 2-5 record while the Rams are tied for second with Air Force at 5-2. Since winning a season-high five in a row the Pack has gone 2-6. CSU has won its last three games, five-of-six and 12 of the last 14 games. COLORADO STATE RAMS: First-year head coach Larry Eustachy has the Rams tied for second with a 5-2 mark in the MW and an overall record of 18-4. Eustachy has a career record 420-272 in his 22nd year. CSU has won three in a row, five-of-six and 12-of-14 heading into Wednesday's game. CSU starts five seniors and all five score in double figures. Senior transfer Colton Iverson (6-10) tops the Rams in scoring at 14 points per game and is second in rebounding at 9.4 per contest. In MW play he averages a double-double, 12.4 points per game and a league best 10.4 rebounds per game. Point guard Dorian Green (6-2) is scoring 12.7 points per game and is third in the MW dishing out 4.05 assists per game. In conference play Green is second in assists at 4.57 per game. Guard Wes Eikmeier (6-3) scores 11.9 points per game and forward Greg Smith (6-6) 10.7 per game. Forward Pierce Hornung (6-5) scores 10.1 points per game and averages a MW best 9.8 rebounds. In conference play his 9.1 rebounds per contest is second to Iverson. Offensively the Rams average 73.5 points per game and allow just 59.3. CSU shoots 44.8 percent from the field and allow opponents to shot 37.9 percent. From three-point range they shoot 33.8 percent and opponents 31.2. They outrebound opponents by 13.7 per game, 42.3-28.6. Nevada is celebrating its 100th year of basketball this season. Carter, the 2012 WAC Coach of the Year, has led the Pack to postseason NIT bids in two of his three years. Last year Carter led the Pack to the Western Athletic Conference title with a 13-1 mark and a 28-7 season record. The 28 wins is the second most in school history. The Pack also tied the school record with 16 consecutive wins. BURTON MAKES SPORTSCENTER TOP 10 TWICE: Junior guard Deonte Burton made the ESPN SportsCenter top 10 plays of the day twice last week. Burton's dunk at UNLV was No. 2 on Tuesday night and his block at #20 New Mexico on Saturday was 10th. Evans had a stretch of three double figure scoring games snapped finishing with seven at #20 New Mexico in the last game. He reached double figures with 14 vs. #25 SDSU, 12 against Boise State and 14 at UNLV. In the seven conference games he has twice reached double figures in rebounds with 10 vs. #25 Wyoming and a game-high 11 at Fresno State. At Air Force his eight rebounds tied for game-high honors as did seven against #25 San Diego State and nine at UNLV. At UNM he finished with a game-high nine boards. Burton scored his 1,000th career point on Nov. 17 against Green Bay and less than 24 hours later Story joined the club, scoring his 1,000th point on Nov. 18 versus Southern Utah. The duo became the 23rd and 24th players in school history to reach the 1,000 point plateau at Nevada. Against Wyoming they both moved past 1,200 career points. After 88 consecutive games starting in the Nevada backcourt the duo are separated by eight points. Burton has 1,296 points to rank 13th in school history while Story's 1,288 is 14th. Burton is 20 back of Luke Babbitt's (2008-10) 1,316 for 12th. Both have benefitted from the change as Burris is averaging 8.2 points and 4.9 rebounds in his 14 starts. In the first seven games of the season he averaged 6.0 points and 2.9 rebounds. Six times in the 14 starts he has scored in double figures marking the first time he has more than one double figure scoring game in a season. Burris made his first start this season at Pacific with his previous start coming his freshman year on Dec. 11, 2010 versus San Francisco State. At Pacific he responded with 14 points and a career-high nine rebounds. The 14 points is one off his career high of 15 set his freshman year versus Pepperdine. He scored 13 points versus Cal Poly and followed that with 11 against San Francisco marking his first back-to-back double digit scoring games. Evans had started 56 consecutive games but was averaging 5.3 points and 3.4 rebounds in the first seven games of the season. His high point total was nine and he was shooting just 35.9 percent. In the seven games off the bench he shot 54.7 percent from the field. In those seven games he averaged 9.6 points per game and grabbed 6.3 rebounds per contest. In his first game off the bench he scored 13 points and grabbed seven rebounds at Pacific. Against Cal Poly he finished with a career-high 14 rebounds. In the Pack's 84-74 victory over Cal State University San Marcos he tied for game-high honors with 18 points which is his season-high and one point off his career-high of 19 set against San Jose State last season. In his seven MW starts he is averaging 9.9 points and 8.1 rebounds per game. In the seven games he has twice reached double figures in rebounds with 10 vs. #25 Wyoming and a game-high 11 at Fresno State. He had a stretch of three double figure scoring games with 14 vs. #25 SDSU, 12 against Boise State and 14 at UNLV. The streak was snapped at UNM when he finished with seven points. After seven MW games Burton is scoring at 17.4 points per game to rank fourth in conference play. He scored 21, 23, 22, 12, 17, 14 and 13 points in the seven MW games. Currently he has reached double figures in the last eight games, his second eight game stretch of the season. Burton's first eight-game double figure scoring stretch ended after finishing with four against Cal Poly. In the eight game stretch he averaged 21.5 points per game. In back-to-back games he scored 28 at Marshall and 26 versus UC Davis. In the last five games of the eight game streak he scored 25 or more points four times including a season-high 29 in the Pack's 76-73 victory at Washington. Seven times he has scored 20 or more points this season. Story struggled to begin MW play totaling just nine points in the first two games before scoring a game-high 24 at Fresno State, tied for game-high honors with 17 versus #25 San Diego State, totaled 16 in the win over Boise State and posted a game-high 20 at #20 UNM. At UNLV he totaled nine points making two-of-seven shots. He scored a career-high 35 in the Pack's 85-75 victory over Yale and has scored 20 or more points in six other games. He had a stretch of scoring in double figures in seven consecutive games until totaling seven against San Francisco but followed that with three more double figure outings. At Air Force he totaled just three points which is his lowest point total at Nevada dating back to the second game of his sophomore season against Pacific in the Preseason NIT at UCLA. In 15-of-21 games he has scored in double figures. He had back-to-back 25 point games versus Southern Utah and at Marshall then followed that with 23 at home against UC Davis and 19 in the Drake game. On the season he is making 34 percent of his three-pointers to rank fifth in the MW and his 2.33 made per game is third in the conference. In 15-of-21 games this season one of the two has posted or tied for game-high honors in points. Burton has eight game highs to his credit and Story seven. Twice he has scored in double figures in MW play with 12 at Air Force and 11 versus Boise State. His only double figure rebound game of the season also came in conference play when he totaled 11 against #25 Wyoming. He also posted a career-best four blocks at Fresno State. Elliott started the first eight games of the season but has come off the bench the last 13 games. In 13 games as a reserve he is averaging 6.4 points and 4.7 rebounds per game while shooting 49.3 percent. Four of his six double figure scoring games have come off the bench. Since coming off the bench he has been sharing the five spot with fellow junior forward Kevin Panzer. Story surpassed 200 career three-pointers made in the Pack's game against Yale and his 219 is second in school history. Marcelus Kemp (2004-08) ranks first with 227 made. In 88 games Story has attempted 567 shots from behind the arc which is third most at Nevada. Terrance Green (1999-03) is second with 592 attempts in his four seasons and 119 games played. Story has been successful on 38.6 (219-of-567) percent of his three-point attempts which is ninth at Nevada. Last season Story attempted a Pack single season record 226 three-pointers and made 94 for a percentage of 41.6. The 41.6 percent ranked 24th in NCAA I and his 2.69 made per game was 37th. The 94 three-pointers made a year ago are second most in Pack history behind Jimmy Carroll's (1996-97) 96. As a sophomore he made 76 three-pointers which is the fourth best season in Pack history. FOUR MOUNTAIN WEST TEAMS RECEIVING NATIONAL RECOGNITION: Nevada faces tough competition in its first year in the Mountain West as four teams are receiving national attention. In the Feb. 4, AP poll, New Mexico is ranked 15th. Colorado State (49), San Diego State (17) and UNLV (13) are receiving votes. UNM is 16th in the USA Today Coaches Poll and SDSU is tied for 25th. Colorado State (38) and UNLV (12) are receiving votes. Four of nine Mountain West teams are in the top 35 of the Feb. 4 NCAA RPI report. New Mexico leads the pack at No. 5, while Colorado State is 15th and UNLV is the third MW school in the top 20 at 19. San Diego State is 33rd. Boise State (51), Wyoming (62), Air Force (68), Nevada (133) and Fresno State (173) round out the conference.
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