GAME NOTES: The Evansville Purple Aces try to log back-to-back wins for the first time since early December as the squad visits the Southern Illinois Salukis for a Missouri Valley Conference showdown at SIU Arena in Carbondale. On Saturday night, the Purple Aces put their offense in gear and came up with a season-high 84 points in a 19-point victory over Missouri State at home. The win was the first in nine league tries this season and snapped an eight-game slide overall. As for the Salukis, they produced a mere 48 points in their meeting with Creighton over the weekend, yet they too came out on the winning side by four points at home. The victory was the third in the last four attempts for SIU, now at 5-4 in league play. Southern Illinois won the first meeting of the season between the squads back on January 15th by a score of 80-67 on the road. As a result, the Salukis now lead the all-time series by a count of 59-46.

Evansville's Jason Holsinger made more shots from three-point range (seven) than any one of his teammates from the field overall in the victory over Missouri State on Saturday. Holsinger finished with a game-high 28 points and also handed out eight assists as well for the Purple Aces who posted their first league win of the season. Shy Ely checked in with 17 points and eight rebounds and Darin Granger tallied 11 points off the bench. All of a sudden Evansville is at the top of the national list as far as three-point shooting is concerned, cranking out 42.8 percent. Oddly enough, the Aces are still third from the bottom in the MVC and 292nd in the country in scoring with just 62.2 ppg. Holsinger and Ely, both of whom have started every game for the Purple Aces this season, lead the team in scoring with 13.5 and 13.3 ppg, respectively, with the former not only knocking down an even 50 percent of his 104 three-point tries, but also accounting for 92 assists.

Southern Illinois shot just 6-of-17 from behind the three-point line on Saturday and a dismal 6-of-12 at the charity stripe, yet the Salukis still got away with the four-point home win nonetheless. Matt Shaw dropped in 16 points and pulled down seven of the team's 28 rebounds, followed by Bryan Mullins with 13 points and four of their six assists. Shaw and Mullins both nailed three three-pointers, which accounted for every one for the Salukis. No longer an offensive machine, SIU is ranked second-to-last in the MVC and 294th in the country in scoring with just 62.1 ppg. However, the defense for Southern Illinois is still one of the best in the business with just 60.5 ppg surrendered to rank 25th in the country. However, this year there are three other MVC programs ahead of the Salukis on that national list, which says a lot about how tight the race in the standings has become. Shaw leads the team with 12.2 ppg, followed by Randal Falker and his 12.0 ppg, with the duo combining for nearly 13 rpg.

Evansville caught lightning in a bottle over the weekend and unless the Purple Aces held onto that particular magic vessel, the squad will have a hard time getting over on SIU on the road tonight.