Editor: The following is part of a press release from siusalukis.com.
The Continental Tire Las Vegas Holiday Invitational is pleased to announce the tournament field for this year’s event, to be held November 22-23, 2018 at the beautiful Orleans Arena in Las Vegas. Joining Southern Illinois in the stellar field are Nevada, Tulsa, and UMass.
Southern Illinois returns all five starters and its top-four leading scorers from last year’s 20-win team, led by first-team All-District guard Armon Fletcher (14.1 ppg). Sean Lloyd Jr. (12.1 ppg) and Kavion Pippen (12.1 ppg) are two of Southern’s six seniors in 2018-19, and both earned postseason awards from the Missouri Valley Conference last year. Eric McGill and Thik Bol will both return to the Salukis after missing last season with injuries. Bol blocked an MVC-leading 76 shots in 2016-17.
The Salukis also return Marcus Bartley and Aaron Cook, who tied for the team lead with 90 assists last year. Cook was named to the MVC’s Most Improved Team after averaging 9.8 points per game as a sophomore. Southern Illinois returns 83 percent of its scoring, 77 percent of its rebounding, and 79 percent of its assists from the 2017-18 team that won 20 games and finished second in the MVC, the best conference finish for the program since 2006-07.
FS1 presents coverage of four 2018 Continental Tire Las Vegas Holiday Invitational games played at Orleans Arena, televising two opening-round games on Thursday, Nov. 22, and the championship and consolation games on Friday, Nov. 23.
Each team will play four games in the Invitational – the first two at on-campus sites.
Twitter Feed
Three more road wins so far in @ValleyHoops as @BradleyUMBB @BelmontMBB & @UIC_MBB capture road wins. Looks like @DrakeBulldogsMB will do so too. #FatherHarry
Well @RacersWBB followed the men's example and swept Iowa in the @ValleyHoops race! Racers are 6-1 & if @BelmontWBB holds on to their Iowa sweep, the Bruins and Racers will be tied for first. What a trip for those two teams! #FatherHarry
After today's action, @EIUWBB is 8-0 in @OVCSports play. 4 teams @usiwbb @TTUWBB @LRTrojans @LindenwoodWBB are tied at 6-2. Six other teams are under .500. Great race to the finish lies ahead. #FatherHarry
Really entertaining game between @BelmontMBB & @UEAthletics_MBB. Under four minutes left in a one point game. Gabriel Pozzato back in the Aces' lineup. Rogers is playing like I've expected. Triples are dropping. It's fun and @kylejpeach bringing it on #ThePlus #FatherHarry
