Men's Basketball | March 5, 2015

PHILADELPHIA – The La Salle men's basketball team closes out its regular season by hosting Dayton on Saturday. It is for Senior Day when La Salle will honor the programs three seniors, DJ Peterson, Jerrell Wright and Steve Zack. The game is scheduled for a 4 p.m. tip with TV coverage on CBSSN and on the radio on WNTP 990 AM.

La Salle Explorers (15-15, 7-10 A-10) vs. Dayton Flyers (23-6, 13-4 A-10)
Saturday, March 7 | 4 PM | Tom Gola Arena 

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TV: CBSSN (Rich Waltz, Alaa Abdelnaby) | 
Radio: WNTP 990 AM | Live Audio | 
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Game Notes
La Salle | Dayton

Last Time Out
La Salle erased a nine point first half deficit, but a 10 point run by the hosts helped Saint Joseph's grab a 55-50 victory. Sophomore Jordan Price led all Explorers with 17 points on the evening including 14 in the second half. The Explorers used timely three pointers to grab up to a six point second half lead. Saint Joes built a seven point second half lead with 3:44 remaining, but a Price three with 1:10 remaining trimmed the lead to just one at 49-48. The Hawks were able to close out the game thanks in part to a three from Chris Wilson late in the shot clock as well as hitting three free throws down the stretch.

Scouting the Explorers
Sophomore Jordan Price leads the team in scoring with 516 points on the year (17.2 ppg.). Price became the 23^rd player in La Salle men's basketball history to record 500 points in a single season and the first sophomore to do so since Steven Smith scored 512 points in the 2003-04 season.

Senior Steve Zack grabbed eight rebounds against St. Joes and now has 800 rebounds in his career. He moved into tenth place all-time in school history. Classmate Jerrell Wright has 826 in his career and currently sits in ninth just four rebounds behind George Sutor who had 826 rebounds between 1962-1965.

The Explorers have turned up the heat defensively in league play, limiting conference opponents 62.1 points per game (3^rd in the A-10). Conference opponents shoot just 41.4 percent from the field, which ranks second behind VCU (41.0%). Those numbers go down to 55.7 and 34.9 in La Salle's six conference wins. The Blue and Gold also hold opponents to just a 21.5 three-point shooting percentage in their conference wins.

Scouting the Flyers
Dayton enters the final weekend of the season allowing only 61.4  points per A-10 game which ranks second in the conference. They are tops in the league averaging 8.4 more points than they give up. As a team they also rank atop the conference shooting .487 from the field and .381 from behind the arch against conference opponents.
 
Senior Jordan Sibert is second in the conference averaging 17.3 ppg in conference play. He has been particularly dangerous from three point range as he averages 2.5 three pointers made per game which is tied for second in the Atlantic 10.
 
Junior Dyshawn Pierre grabs 9.4 rebounds per contest which is good for fourth in the conference. Sophomore Kendall Pollard has been one of the more effective scorers during league play shooting .600 against conference opponents.

Up Next
La Salle travels to Brooklyn for the Atlantic 10 Tournament starting next Wednesday at the Barclays Center. Tickets are available here. The Explorers will open the tournament on Thursday as either the ninth or tenth seed with game time at either noon or 6:30 PM on NBCSN.