— By Bill Cornwell
HUNTINGTON, W.Va. — After a 10-point win at UTEP on Saturday, the Marshall basketball team now knows who it will face the remainder of the regular season.
Conference USA released its bonus play schedule Sunday, a slate which pits teams against opponents in similar position within the league standings.
Marshall (13-14) is in Pod No. 2 after finishing scheduled C-USA play with a 7-7 league record, tying the Herd with UAB and Old Dominion for sixth place. After sorting through tiebreakers, Marshall is seeded seventh in bonus play.
FAU and UTSA are also in the second pod.
MU head coach Dan D’Antoni is anxious to begin pod play.
“To have lost the type of production we had last season and have stayed where we are with the program, I’m happy, but there’s a lot of basketball to play,” D’Antoni said. “There’s three weeks of this stuff. We can do some damage. We’re close and I’ve said it all along that we’ve got to finish up strong like we did against UTEP.”
The top group is made up of North Texas, Western Kentucky, Louisiana Tech, Charlotte and FIU, while the bottom pod consists of Southern Miss, Rice, UTEP and Middle Tennessee.
Marshall opens pod play at home this Saturday night by hosting Old Dominion, a team the Herd edged at the Henderson Center on Jan. 18, 68-67. Taevion Kinsey, Jarrod West and Iran Bennett combined for 45 points in that contest.
Other bonus play games for Marshall include another home game on March 4 against FAU and road games on Feb. 27 at UAB and March 7 at UTSA. Marshall dropped road games this season to each of the those three teams.
Marshall’s positioning means it can’t be seeded any higher than sixth or lower than 10th in the upcoming C-USA Tournament in Frisco, Texas.
The Herd is in a similar position to last season, when it was also in Pod 2 and finished sixth, before going on to win the CIT.
The Herd returned home Saturday night from its Texas road trip with some momentum after a 71-61 win at UTEP. Marshall’s top two scorers, Kinsey and West, combined to score only 16 points against the Miners, but forwards Jannson Williams and Mikel Beyers combined for 32 points to pick up the slack and lead the Herd to victory.