By Mark Bennett
Marcus Howard suffered through some crowd-chants
of "air-ball, air-ball" in road games earlier this
season.
So when his fourth 3-pointer of the night
splashed through the Hulman Center net Thursday night, a jolt
of confidence surged through Howard and purged some of those
demons.
This time, a pro-Sycamore crowd of 4,825 stood
and cheered.
That shot came with 2 minutes and 28 seconds
to play against Missouri Valley Conference-leading Northern Iowa,
and gave Howard and his Indiana State teammates a 68-63 lead.
The Sycamores eventually lost 71-70 after four late turnovers
helped set up a game-winning layup by Panther star Robbie Sieverding.
Gut-wrenching as that defeat was for Indiana
State, at least the Sycamores rediscovered a double-edged sword
in their arsenal -- Howard. And that could come in handy today,
when he and the Sycamores (3-10 overall, 1-3 in the MVC) will
try for their first road victory of the season against Illinois
State (5-10, 1-3) at 5:05 p.m. in Redbird Arena.
The 6-foot-3, 185-pound sophomore has been
Indiana State's defensive stopper virtually since his arrival
from Elgin (Ill.) High School in the fall of 2000. But on Thursday,
Howard broke out of a season-long shooting slump to score a career-high
18 points. He hit 6 of 12 field goals, including 4 of 7 3-point
shots, and totaled five assists, two turnovers and a steal in
35 minutes. His scoring average climbed to 8.2 points per game.
Howard's previous high was 16 points against
powerful Gonzaga in the NCAA Tournament's second round last season.
He was shooting more accurately back then, finishing with percentages
of 36.3 from 3-point range and 38.6 overall. Before Thursday,
Howard was shooting 30.4 percent from the field and 19.5 percent
on 3-point attempts.
"Once you hit a couple in a row, you
start getting more confident to take those kind of shots,"
Howard said. "In the past games, I haven't been shooting
well, and I think that's been effecting my shot. And this game,
I was [getting] good looks, I was able to penetrate and I got
some easy buckets to start the game. And that kind of helped
me behind the arc."
In the first half, he had two picturesque
baskets that energized the crowd and erased Northern Iowa's early
20-6 lead. On the first, Howard swept down the baseline just
past the basket and laid the ball back into the hoop. Minutes
later, he stole the ball from Sieverding in mid-dribble, raced
to the other end of the court to rattle in a 3-pointer.
All the while, Howard was holding Sieverding
-- the MVC's leading scorer at 20 points per game -- to a season-low
11. Game after game, the opponent's best player is typically
his assignment.
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| Tribune-Star/Joseph
C. Garza |
| Another tough loss: Indiana
State guard Marcus Howard feels the weight of defeat after the
Sycamores' loss to Northern Iowa Thursday in Hulman Center. |
"Marcus is as good a defender as I've
ever coached," said Sycamore Coach Royce Waltman. "He
can guard off the ball, he can guard on the ball, and he's tall
enough once the guy comes to a stop to bother his shot."
The resurgence of Howard's offensive skills
creates an interesting prospect for ISU -- if he continues to
hit shots.
"[Thursday] night, he played both ends,"
Waltman said. "If he would be that consistent on offense,
that would really change our team."
Indeed, Howard's shooting infected his teammates
Thursday. ISU, the MVC's lowest-scoring team, made 49 percent
of its shots against Northern Iowa. Interestingly, the Redbirds
rank last in the conference in field goal defense.
But with ESPN2 televising today's game nationally,
both teams are missing their premier players because of injuries.
A torn knee muscle will keep Sycamore senior Kelyn Block out
for at least two more weeks. And a dislocated wrist ended the
Redbirds' MVC Player of the Year Tarise Bryson's season in the
first game.
Instead, the most interesting duel might come
inside, where each team has a double-double threat -- Illinois
State transfer Baboucarr Bojang and Indiana State senior Djibril
Kante. Bojang leads the Redbirds in scoring and rebounding, and
Kante had 17 points and 10 rebounds against Northern Iowa.
"We've got to control [Bojang] inside,"
Waltman said.
The tricky part is doing that on the opponent's
home court. Both Illinois State and the Sycamores are 0-6 in
hostile arenas so far.
Howard is well aware of that statistic.
"Any game on the road in the Valley is
a tough game," he said.
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