ST. PAUL, Minn. - The Concordia Golden Bears men's basketball team (4-18, 3-13 NSIC) is gearing up for the final stretch of the regular season as they make the trip to St. Cloud State (15-6, 11-4 NSIC) on Friday and Minnesota Duluth (9-12, 5-10 NSIC) on Saturday.

LAST TIME OUT
After dropping their first two games of the week to MSU and BSU, the Golden Bears bounced back to claim a 74-68 victory over UMC on Saturday to close out their five game home stand.

While CSP outshot their opponents by a large margin (48.0% to 44.0%) overall for the week, three-point shooting proved to be an issue as their opponents hit 36 threes at a 42.9% clip while they hit 14 at a 31.1% clip. Turnovers were another area that hurt Concordia as they committed 48 turnovers and forced 33 in the three games. Rebounding continued to be a strong point for the Golden Bears as they put up a large 110-95 edge, including a 27-25 edge in offensive rebounds.

Bryndan Matthews put up back-to-back career nights in scoring with 28 against BSU and 29 against UMC as he averaged 22.7 points and 7.7 boards on the week. Avan Ward added 13.7 points per game to go along with 4.3 rebounds and 4.3 assists in a team-high 35.0 minutes per night. Ted Brown continued to be extremely efficient as he connected on 80.0% (12-15) of his shots en route to averaging 8.7 points and 5.0 rebounds in 17.0 minutes per game in the three contests.

SCSU SERIES HISTORY
The Golden Bears will meet the Huskies for the 26th time in series history on Friday as CSP has gone 6-19 in the previous 25 meetings. Concordia's best stretch in the series came between 2010-12 as they won three of four meetings during that span. Since then, SCSU has won five of the last six with their lone win coming on Jan. 3, 2015 in St. Paul. In 13 meetings in St. Cloud, CSP has gone 2-11.

LAST MEETING VS SCSU
In the lone meeting last season, an efficient St. Cloud State squad handed Concordia an 88-56 loss in St. Paul.

Shooting proved to be the difference on the night as the Huskies hit an impressive 54.0% (34-63) from the floor and 43.5% (10-23) from deep while Concordia shot 33.9% (21-62) from the floor and 16.7% (3-18) from beyond the arc. SCSU also held a 22-11 edge in assists as well as 21-12 edge in points off of turnovers on the night.
 
Diallo Powell gave Concordia a spark off the bench with a team-high 15 points to go along with five rebounds as he hit 7-14 from the floor.
 
Powell was joined by Bryndan Matthews in double figures as Matthews chipped in 14 points and seven boards as well as three assists on the night. Max Keefe added eight points while Ted Brown had six.

Gage Davis and Scottie Stone combined to lead the way for St. Cloud State with 19 points apiece as Davis hit 8-14 and Stone hit 7-13 and 5-10 from three. Davis also had eight rebounds, four assists and a pair of steals while Stone added six boards and three assists.

ABOUT THE HUSKIES
St. Cloud State had a big weekend with road victories over Wayne State College (82-58) on Jan. 26 and Augustana (80-63) on Jan. 27 as the program has now won 13 of the last 17 games. The team has won six straight home games with the last loss coming to Southwest Minnesota State in early December (12/9/17).

Davis, a junior from Bolingbrook, Ill., was named the NSIC North Player of the Week on Monday, Jan. 29, after averaging 19 points 11 rebounds and five assists per game in leading the team to wins over Wayne State and Augustana. He had double-double in both games and four on the season as it was the fifth time the last two seasons and the sixth time in his career that Davis has been named the NSIC North Division Player of the Week.

Jon Averkamp is sixth in the NSIC in scoring at 19.5 points per game as he leads the league in field goal percentage (61.5) shooting (156-for-252).

UMD SERIES HISTORY
Heading into Saturday's matchup, the Golden Bears hold a record of 12-14 against the Bulldogs. The momentum has been heavily shifted in CSP's favor in the past few years as they have won 12 of the last 16 and and eight of the last 10 in the series. Both of CSP's losses during that stretch came in Duluth as UMD has won three of the last five on their home court. Overall, Concordia holds a record of 5-8 in Duluth.

LAST MEETING VS UMD
Back on Feb. 4 of last season, the Golden Bears exploded on the offensive end to claim a 95-85 win on their home court.
 
In a game when both team's offenses were on display, Concordia's Diallo Powell led all scorers in the game with 27 points off the bench. Powell's 27 were a career high for the senior as well as the most points scored by an individual CSP player during the season.

Bryndan Matthews also poured in 21 points and nine boards to help Powell shoulder the load. Freshman Max Keefe (14 pts), Sam Siganos (11 pts), and Ted Brown (11 pts) all chipped in as well, putting five Golden Bears in double digits.

Attacking the basket on the dribble and hitting cutters to the hoop throughout the game, Concordia used a barrage of different finishes at the rim to finish with season highs in points (95) and field goal percentage (59.3%). The Golden Bears scored an impressive 44 points (compared to the Bulldogs 20) in the paint and put in 32 points off the bench.

ABOUT THE BULLDOGS
It's been an up-and-down season for Minnesota Duluth as they dropped seven of their first nine to start the season before winning seven of nine through the middle portion of the season. Since then, UMD has dropped three in a row bring their record to 9-12, including a mark of 5-10 in league play heading into the weekend.

An area of strength during the NSIC season for the Bulldogs has been their ability to take care of the basketball as they rank in the top five in the league in fewest turnovers while also ranking seventh in turnover margin. UMD has also made it tough for opponents at the rim as their 3.0 blocks per game register in at sixth in the conference. Minnesota Duluth also ranks seventh in the league in offensive rebounds with 9.1 per game.

Brandon Myer has been the focal point of the offense for the Bulldogs this season as he leads the team by a wide margin with 20.1 points per game. Myer is one of four players in the league to average at least 20 a game this season as he has surpassed that mark in 12 of the past 14 games. Joining Myer in double figures for UMD this season in Logan Rohrscheib at 13.9 points per game. Trevor Entwisle has added a team-best 4.0 assists per game as well as 25 steals as an every-game starter so far this year.

NSIC LEADERS
So far this season, the Golden Bears have had several players rank near the top of the league in different statistical categories.

Bryndan Matthews has been impressive filling up the stat sheet as he has put up top-15 numbers in five different categories. Matthews cleaned up the boards at a solid rate as his 7.3 rebounds per game rank fourth in the league (153rd in the nation) while his 2.6 offensive boards per game rank second (127th in the nation) as well. The junior has also been the team's go-to scorer as his 17.4 points per game rank seventh while he also ranks third in minutes per game (35.9).

In addition, Ted Brown ranks inside the top-15 in a few categories with his 63.4% shooting percentage (third) and 1.7 offensive rebounds per game (15th) while Avan Ward registers in at eighth in threes made per game with 2.3 and Evan Wesenberg ranks 12th with 0.8 blocks per game.

CLIMBING THE RANKS
Junior Bryndan Matthews has been a major contributor throughout his three seasons on campus and has started to climb the career ranks at Concordia. The Eagan native is up to 13th in scoring (1,154), sixth in rebounds (543), fourth in rebounds per game (6.8), eighth in field goals made (422) and ninth in free throws made (259) in his career at CSP.