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HELENA, Mont. -- A big road trip precedes No. 3 Carroll College's next two basketball games, but what awaits them on the other end remains to be seen.
The Fighting Saints travel to No. 10 Lewis-Clark State to face the Warriors on Thursday and then head back to Montana to meet up with Western on Saturday.
"LC State has some very good depth, they often times play 10-plus guys," Saints coach
Kurt Paulson said. "They are coming off two losses and we are coming off a loss at Rocky. It will be a physical game. We know our guys will bounce back and compete. We talked about this stretch of games and taking it one at a time. LC has a very talented point guard and some athletic wings. For us the key to the game will be the rebounding battle."
A wacky week in the Frontier Conference last week means the both teams are hungry to rebound. The Saints fell to Rocky Mountain College (RV) last Thursday. Rocky then fell to Montana Tech, who Carroll beat earlier.
At the same time, Lewis-Clark State took its first conference road trip and suffered its first conference losses of the season, falling to a rising Providence team and then falling to Montana State-Northern. After the whirlwind of wins and losses across the conference, the Saints still sat in the top spot at the end of the week.
The Saints and Warriors will both be looking for a major bounceback win, but it's the Saints making the 300-plus mile drive to Lewiston.
Carroll continues to be powered by a trio of scoring options.
Match Burnham leads the team with 20.3 points per night, while
Matt Wyman and
Dane Warp both nearly score 20 per game.
The Saints also remain a highly efficient shooting team. Carroll is the No. 1 team in the NAIA in free throw percentage (82), No. 3 in three-point percentage (43) and No. 4 in field goal percentage (53).
Lewis-Clark holds the No. 1 marks in the NAIA D-I in assists per game (22.5), assist-turnover ratio (2.2) and scoring margin (35.6). A lot of those numbers come from weak non-conference competition, though it should be noted that the squad under first-year head coach Austin Johnson is still one of the best teams in the Frontier.
Four Warriors average double figures. Dana Abe leads the way with 14.5 points per game. Damek Mitchell (13.1), Cory Dollarhide (12.8) and Race Martin (12.2) all join him in scoring over points per game.
On Saturday, the Saints head to Dillon to take on Western (7-8). The Bulldogs are looking for their first signature win under first-year head coach Mike Larsen. Western defeated MSU-Northern last week, but also suffered a 112-69 setback against Providence, coached by former UMW head man Steve Keller.
Western is led by Kooper Kidgell's 15.7 points per game.
The Saints tip off against Lewis-Clark State at 8:30 p.m. on Thursday.
