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'Depleted' Pirates duel
DePaul
Bonesville.net staff report
©2004 Bonesville.net
East Carolina will be shorthanded when it returns home tonight to face
DePaul at 7 p.m. in a Conference USA matchup in Williams Arena at Minges
Coliseum.
The Pirates are
coming off an 80-57 loss at No. 8 Cincinnati
on Wednesday night in which senior forward Erroyl Bing and freshman wing
player Frank Robinson were sidelined by cramps.
ECU coach Bill Herrion said
both Bing and Robinson will be available, although sophomore forward Corey
Rouse is still out with a concussion.
The Pirates lost mainstay
senior post player Gabriel Mikulas
for
the season when he broke his right arm in practice on Jan.
14.
“We’re a little bit depleted
right now and that’s a concern,” Herrion said.
DePaul (10-7, 3-3 C-USA), on
the other hand, is getting a valued player back for what will likely be the
Blue Demons' last trip to Greenville because of their move to the Big East
in 2005-06. Senior power forward Andre Brown (6-feet-9, 245 pounds), who
averaged 13.1 points and 10.6 rebounds in DePaul’s first eight games is
scheduled to return from a knee injury.
The Blue Demons have had a
week to regroup from a 70-62 loss at Marquette.
Second year DePaul coach Dave
Leitao and Herrion opposed each other when Leitao was at Northeastern and
Herrion was at Drexel. Leitao was an assistant at Connecticut for six
seasons before taking the reins at DePaul prior to the 2002-03 season.
Leitao’s club is led by
6-7 senior wing forward Delonte Holland, who is averaging 18.2 points.
Another wing player, Quemont Greer, averages 11.9, as does guard Drake
Diener, whose brother, Travis, plays at Marquette.
“They’re good, really solid,”
Herrion said. “But if we play our game, we can win. The concern we have
right now is that we’re struggling to put the ball in the basket. That’s a
little bit of an issue right now.”
The Pirates are 8-8 overall
and 0-6 in league play against a demanding schedule. ECU has played five of
the top six teams in the C-USA standings, including No. 4 Louisville. ECU’s
strength of schedule component in the Sagarin ratings has climbed from 325th
out of 326 Division I teams in late December to its present position of
186th since the Pirates began their C-USA schedule.
“It’s been a very, very tough
early (league) schedule, but the fact is we need to win a game,” Herrion
said. “We’ve talked to the players about that being our focus. Hopefully we
can win a game and that can turn it around. Against UAB and Houston we had
chances. We were in position to win.
“We’re not playing that bad.
We’re not that far off. That’s the frustrating thing.”
ECU’s women’s basketball team
(14-4, 5-0) hosts Marquette (15-4, 5-1) at
1 p.m. Fans with a ticket to the DePaul-ECU men’s game will be admitted free
to the women’s game. Fans in ECU apparel can get a ticket to the women’s
game for $1.
Pirate club representatives
have a meeting and a banquet scheduled between the games beginning at 3:30
p.m.
Copyright 2004
Bonesville.net. All rights reserved. This material may not be
published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
02/23/2007 11:44:03 AM
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