Men's Basketball Heads To The Last Frontier For Carrs/Safeway Great Alaska Shootout

Nov. 21	8:30 pm	vs. Northeastern	Game Notes	Live Video	Listen Live	Live Stats	Purchase Tickets
Nov. 23	TBD	vs. TBD		Live Video	Listen Live	Live Stats	Purchase Tickets
Nov. 24	TBD	vs. TBD		Live Video	Listen Live	Live Stats	Purchase Tickets

Anchorage, AK—The UC Riverside Men's Basketball Team is scrounging through its collective closets in search of cold weather gear to take to the Last Frontier this week as they take part in the 2012 Carrs/Safeway Great Alaska Shootout. The 35th annual event tips off for the Highlanders on Wednesday, November 21 against Northeastern. Game time is slated for 8:30 pm PT.

UC Riverside is coming off of its first win of the season via an 89-76 victory over Whitman College (box score/recap). Junior Chris Harriel poured in a career-high 26 points in the win, while freshman Josh Fox and senior Robert Smith each chipped in season highs with 18 and 17 points respectively.

Fox is the Highlanders leading scorer on the season, averaging 11.8 points per game, and third on the squad in rebounding grabbing 6.0 per contest. Smith is also averaging double figures in scoring for UCR at 10.0 points per game, while Harriel (9.5) and junior transfer Chris Patton (9.3) sit just outside double digits.

Another junior transfer, Lucas Devenny, leads the team in rebounding at 8.7 per game, thanks in large part to a career-high 15 boards vs. Whitman.

This marks the first time that the Highlanders and Northeastern have faced one another. The Huskies opened the 2012-13 season with a pair of one-point victories over Boston (65-64) and Princeton (67-66) before dropping a 66-55 decision to Vermont on Saturday.

Guard Joel Smith (17.0 ppg), swing man Quincey Ford (15.0) and forward Reggie Spencer (14.7) account for 46.7 of the Huskies's 62.3 points per game. The trio is 47 for 90 from the field (52.2%) while Smith and Ford are a combined 14 for 28 from long distance (50.0%). The remainder of the team is 17 for 43 from the field (39.5%) and 5 for 21 from three-point range (23.8%).

The winner of the UC Riverside vs. Northeastern match up will take on the winner of the Belmont/Alaska Anchorage winner on Friday, November 23 at 8 pm. The losers of both games will square off against one another at 2 pm that same day.

This is the fourth in-season tournament in which UC Riverside has participated since the Highlanders made the move to Division I. The 2011-12 season saw UCR take part in the 76 Classic in Anaheim, CA where the Highlanders lost their opening game to Villanova (box score/recap), took Boston College to overtime before falling 66-62 (box score/recap) and upended Washington State, 64-63 (box score/recap/listen to the call of the final seconds).

Two years ago, they traveled to SMU where they went 1-2 defeating the host Mustangs, 73-69, in double overtime (box score/recap), but losing to Lamar, 90-75 (box score/recap), and Portland State, 69-58 (box score/recap).

UCR’s first tournament experience came at the beginning of the 2006-07 season. Iowa State hosted the event which saw the Highlanders lose 69-61 to the Cyclones on November 10 (box score/recap), upend Eastern Illinois on November 11 by a 64-55 score (box score/recap), and drop a 76-64 decision to Louisiana Monroe on November 12 (box score/recap).

Men's Basketball Heads To The Last Frontier For Carrs/Safeway Great Alaska Shootout

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