No. 25 BYU Looks To Bounce Back

Cougars look to match nation's longest active home-court winning streak against Lamar Wednesday

Dec. 11, 2007

A return to the Marriott Center, along with a significantly easier opponent, might be what BYU needs to bounce back from its most recent loss.

Coming off its second defeat to a Top 25 team, the 25th-ranked Cougars look to match the nation's longest active home-court winning streak when they play Lamar on Wednesday.

BYU (7-2) slipped five spots and barely remained in the AP poll after suffering a 68-61 loss to then-No. 9 Michigan State on Saturday. Though it was considered a home game for the Cougars, the game was played at Salt Lake City's EnergySolutions Arena and did not affect BYU's current run of 35 consecutive home-court victories.

All of the Cougars' four games this season at the Marriott Center in Provo have been decided by at least 15 points. With a victory Wednesday, they will match Memphis for the nation's longest active home-court win streak at 36 games.

BYU, which lost 83-71 to Loyola Marymount on Nov. 18, 2005 for its most recent loss at the Marriott Center, hosts Pepperdine on Saturday and Southern Utah on Dec. 21. If the wins keep coming, the Cougars could own the country's longest streak outright because second-ranked Memphis doesn't play at home until Dec. 22 against No. 5 Georgetown.

It does not appear this game should get in the Cougars' way, considering Lamar (3-5) has not defeated a Division I opponent all season and has lost 14 straight against ranked foes since beating then-No. 12 Louisiana Tech 72-64 on Jan. 26, 1985.

However, the Cardinals were just 3-6 and had lost three straight going into a home game against BYU last season and pulled off a surprising 86-77 overtime victory. Lamar blew a 14-point halftime lead before winning.

The Cougars were up 10 points at halftime of their most recent game before falling to Michigan State.

After limiting the Spartans to 29.4 percent shooting in the first half, BYU struggled to handle the more physical Michigan State post players in the second half. The Spartans, who opened the half with a 14-3 run, went 16-for-24 from the field in the final 20 minutes and outscored the Cougars 28-12 in the paint.

"What I am real pleased with is how our team battled," BYU coach Dave Rose said. "We had a lot of opportunities, and they just slipped away. If we could have executed better we could have won this game."

Leading scorer Trent Plaisted had 19 points and eight rebounds for the Cougars, who average 79.2 points but were held to a season low Saturday. BYU's previous low came in a 73-63 loss to No. 1 North Carolina on Nov. 24 in the Las Vegas Invitational title game.

"The beginning of the second half was a really tough stretch for our team, but we left it all out there on the court," said the 6-foot-11 Plaisted, a junior who averages 17.8 points with 9.2 rebounds and needs 13 points to reach 1,000 for his career.

A candidate for Mountain West player of the year, Plaisted was limited to eight points with six rebounds before fouling out in last year's loss to Lamar. He did have 16 points and seven boards in the Cougars' 97-74 win over the Cardinals in Salt Lake City on Nov. 30, 2005 in the first meeting between the schools.

Lamar (3-5) looks for its third straight victory Wednesday after beating a pair of non-Division I opponents. The Cardinals won 117-67 over Division III Louisiana College last Saturday, four days after beating NAIA member St. Gregory's 95-59 on Dec. 4.

Junior Kenny Dawkins had 21 points - about five more than his team-leading average - and Lamar Sanders added 15 with seven steals on Saturday.

Sanders had 19 points, seven assists and six rebounds versus BYU last season.