LITTLE ROCK -- Several local athletes will be featured today as the women's and men's teams from Arkansas State make their way to the Jack Stephens Center to face Little Rock in the state capital's most popular rivalry games.
The women's game will pit the Sun Belt Conference leaders against the league's fourth-place team. They will open the doubleheader at 3 p.m.
The men's game will follow at about 5:15 p.m. Unlike the women, the men's teams are mired near the bottom of the Sun Belt standings.
Little Rock's women (9-8, 6-0) are led by 6-0 junior forward Ronjanae DeGray, a graduate of Mount Juliet High School in Tennessee. She ranks 12th in the Sun Belt in scoring with 13.5 points per game and is tied for second on the team in rebounding with an average of 5.2.
Kyra Collier, a sophomore guard from North Little Rock High School, is second on the team in scoring at 9.3 points per game and is tied for second in rebounding with DeGray. Senior point guard Monique Towson, a graduate of Staley High School in Kansas City, Mo., is fourth on the team at scoring with 7.8 points per game and leads the team in assists with 4.1 per game.
DeGray's twin sister, Raeyana DeGray, leads the Trojans in rebounds per game wth 5.4. The younger DeGray adds nine points per contest.
Malvern High School graduate and redshirt junior guard Akasha Westbrook leads the Red Wolves (9-8, 4-2) with 13.7 points per game, ranking 11th in the conference. She also has team-highs in field goal percentage, 48.3; defensive rebounds, 3.8; assists, 2.1; steals, 2.3; and minutes, 31.6.
Jada Ford, of Muskogee High School in Oklahoma, is averaging the second most points on the team with 9.3. She ranks third on the team with 21.5 minutes per game and has combined with fellow sophomore guard Payton Tennison, a graduate of Valley Springs High School, to hit 49 of the team's 71 3-pointers this season.
Senior Lauren Bradshaw, a 6-2 forward from Mesquite Horn High School in Texas, averages a team-high 5.9 rebounds per game and adds nine points in 25.6 minutes per game. She has made 41 of 46 free throws for a team-best 89.1 percent.
Little Rock leads the conference in scoring defense, giving up only 55.6 points per game, while Arkansas State averages 66. The Trojans rank ninth in scoring at 58.5 points and Arkansas ranks 10th on defense at 73.1.
The host team boasts the highest free throw shooting percentage in the conference at 73.3 percent, while the visitors shoot 68.2 percent, sixth-best in the Sun Belt.
The coaches of the women's teams, Brian Boyer at Arkansas State and Joe Foley at Little Rock, have coached a combined 32 years at their respective schools and have each won the Sun Belt Conference Coach of the Year Award four times. Boyer's record is 315-262 and Foley is 298-161.
The men's matchup will mark the 86th game between the two rivals. The Trojans (5-14, 2-4) have posted a winning home record every year since Jack Stephens opened in 2005, but are 5-5 on their home court this season.
Little Rock's leading scorer, Andre Jones, is a graduate of Malvern. He guided the Leopards to the Class 4A state championship game a year after he won the Class 5A championship and most valuable player award with Little Rock McClellan.
Jones is first on the team in scoring, 12.2, and minutes, 29.4, second in rebounds with 4.4 per game and second in assists with 2.3. He recently bounced back from a stretch in which he scored 33 points in five games to score 13 in a 72-69 loss at Georgia Southern (14-5, 5-1), 24 in a 77-65 home win over UT-Arlington (12-7, 3-3) and 19 in a 72-70 defeat by Texas State (13-7, 6-1).
Junior Anthony Black, a 5-7 guard from Little Rock Hall, is second on the team in scoring and leads the Trojans with 25 3-pointers. Sophomore guard Ryan Pippins, of Little Rock Parkview, returned the roster eight games ago and is averaging 8.3 points. Pippins has started the last three games.
The Trojans' leading rebounder is Oliver Black, a 6-9 redshirt junior forward from Jackson, Miss., who attended the IMG Academy. Black averages 7.4 rebounds and 6.6 points per game and ranks second on the team in minutes, 27.6.
Arkansas State (6-13, 1-5) won its first conference game against Louisiana-Monroe (7-10, 1-5) before losing five straight by an average of 15 points, including an 80-49 loss to Georgia Southern and a 97-71 loss on Saturday to Arlington.
The Red Wolves are one of the better shooting teams in the league, ranking fourth at 44.5 percent for the season, and are sixth overall in points per game at 73.7. They also rank last in the conference in field goal percentage defense at 48.9 percent and last in scoring defense at 77.9 points per game, allowing nearly nine more points per game than the Trojans. Little Rock's 64.5 points per game is last in the league by almost four points.
Senior 6-4 guard Deven Simms is the No. 7 scorer in the Sun Belt with 16.8 points per game and leads his team in rebounding with an average of 5.9. Simms previously lived in St. Louis, Mo., before he moved to Clarksville to win a Class 4A state championship.
The Panthers made it to the Class 5A semifinals the following year and Simms signed with Connors State College. Simms transferred to Arkansas State before his junior season and was second on the team in scoring with 13.4 per game a year ago.
Ty Cockfield, a junior guard from Robert Wood Johnson High School in Georgia and a transfer from Georgia Highlands College, averages 13.3 points in 29.1 minutes per game. Senior point guard Rashad Lindsey, a transfer from Moberly Area Community College in Missouri, adds 8.3 points and a team-high 2.6 assists in 29.6 minutes per game, second behind Simms.
The Red Wolves' next three players in minutes are also junior college transfers. Tamas Bruce, a senior 6-7 forward, is from Osceola and transferred from John A. Logan College in Illinois. Bruce adds 9.7 points per game and is second on the team in rebounds with 5.2.
Grantham Gillard, 9.2 points, is from Minneapolis and transferred from South Plains College in Texas. Tristin Walley, from Richton, Miss., is a transfer from Jones County Junior College in Mississippi and averaging 5.9 points and 4.3 rebounds per game.
Mike Balado is in his first season as the head coach of Arkansas State. Wes Flanigan is 20-31 in two seasons at Little Rock after taking over for Chris Beard, who guided the Trojans to a 30-5 record and a win in the NCAA Tournament in his only season with the program. Beard is currently the head coach of No. 8 Texas Tech.
Sports on 01/20/2018