DUNK CITY, Fla. – Winners of three straight, the FGCU men's basketball team (14-7, 4-1 Atlantic Sun Conference) will host Lipscomb (10-10, 4-1 A-Sun) Thursday at 7 p.m. at Alico Arena in a battle of two teams currently tied for second place in the league.
 
SETTING THE STAGE
FGCU, ranked No. 21 in the CollegeInsider.com Mid-Major Poll, is coming off its first road weekend A-Sun sweep since the 2012-13 season with victories over USC Upstate (71-68) and Kennesaw State (54-48) last Thursday and Saturday, respectively. Lipscomb, meanwhile, dropped its first A-Sun contest of the year on Saturday at home to North Florida, 75-66. The Eagles and the Bisons are a game ahead of Northern Kentucky (9-11, 3-2 A-Sun) and one game behind UNF (13-9, 5-0 A-Sun) as the Ospreys have defeated both FGCU and Lipscomb.
 
WHAT TO KNOW
Like its first two A-Sun home contests, the game is expected to be a standing-room-only sellout, with an extremely limited amount of general-admission tickets still available which can be purchased in person at the Alico Arena Ticket Office, by calling 239-590-7145 or by logging on to FGCUAthletics.com/Tickets. Like all FGCU home games, the contest – presented by Ameriprise Financial – will be broadcast on ESPN3 and via the Watch ESPN app. David Moulton will handle the play-by-play duties with J. Webb Horton serving as the analyst.
 
All fans in attendance are asked to donate new shoes or make a financial contribution as former FGCU baseball standout and current Chicago White Sox staff ace Chris Sale and his wife, Brianne, have partnered with local charity Laces of Love to help children in need in Lee and Collier counties. Watch the video accompanying this release for more information, and click here for even more about the initiative.
 
At halftime, current FGCU baseball players Jake Noll and Mike Murray will be honored for their tremendous 2014 seasons as Noll was named the National Freshman of the Year and Murray was tabbed as a Second Team All American. Additionally, red FGCU T-Shirts will be available for purchase in the lobby for $10. All proceeds go to support the American Heart Association, and the shirts can be worn on Feb. 14 and 19 for the REDOUT games. Finally, raffle tickets to the 2015 Final Four will be available for purchase at the marketing tables immediately upon entry into the arena.
 
TWEETABLES (5 Things To Know In 140 Characters Or Less)
1) Lipscomb is the only A-Sun team in the last 20 regular-season games to defeat FGCU at Alico Arena (87-78 in overtime on Jan. 17, 2013).
2) 14-7 is FGCU's best D-I start through 21 games in program history; the 4-1 A-Sun start is tied with last year and 2012-13 as the best.
3) FGCU has had five-straight games with 14 or more offensive rebounds (76 total) for the first time since the 2010-11 season.
4) With those offensive rebounds, the Eagles have posted five-straight games of 12 or more second-chance points (89 total).
5) Since the 2012-13 season, FGCU is 33-1 when leading at the half; the lone loss came earlier this year to FIU (32-28 halftime lead).
 
SCOUTING LIPSCOMB
^ The Bisons had their five-game winning streak come to an end with the loss to UNF.
^ Lipscomb is 8-3 at home but only 2-8 on the road.
^ Josh Williams leads the Lipscomb scoring attack with 16.5 points per game, good for third in the A-Sun. Lipscomb is second in the A-Sun at 71.8 points per game and second with 8.4 3-pointers made per game.
^ Senior Martin Smith was a unanimous Preseason All-Atlantic Sun Team member but has only played seven games this year (no A-Sun contests) as he is battling a foot injury. The 6-5 forward scored a career-high 30 points against FGCU on Feb. 16, 2013.
^ Lipscomb was picked to finish third in the A-Sun Preseason Coaches Poll, but were tabbed for a second-place finish in the A-Sun Preseason Media Poll.

KEY FOCUS
Long-range shooting will likely play a key factor in the outcome of the game. Lipscomb has made the second-most 3-pointers in the A-Sun with 167 as its 8.4 per-game average is 27th in the nation. FGCU boasts the best perimeter defense in the A-Sun and the third-best 3-point defense in the nation as the Eagles allow opponents to shoot just 26.2 percent from beyond the arc.
 
In last year's meeting at Lipscomb, the Bisons scored 92 points and made 15 3s – both season highs for any FGCU opponent. In its lone A-Sun loss of the year, FGCU allowed season highs to UNF as the Ospreys made 12 3-pointers and shot 48 percent (12-25).
 
SERIES HISTORY
Lipscomb leads the all-time series, 9-4, but over the past six games the two sides have been deadlocked, 3-3. The contests have typically been high scoring as in 11 of the 13 meetings FGCU has tallied more than 70 points, and in nine of the 13 matchups both teams have recorded more than 70 points. Last year's 21-point loss at Lipscomb (92-71) was FGCU's worst A-Sun defeat since a 23-point setback (86-63) against Belmont on Feb. 11, 2012.
 
#NESTPROTECTED
FGCU is 38-4 at Alico Arena since the start of the 2012-13 season. The four losses have come to Lipscomb, Iona, Mercer and FIU, snapping – respectively – a nine-game home-court winning streak, another nine-game streak, a 12-game stretch and a four-game run. FGCU went 15-1 in 2012-13, 15-2 last year and is 8-1 this season.
 
HOME-COURT ADVANTAGE
FGCU is statistically better in every key area at home than on the road, with the lone somewhat surprising exception being free-throw shooting. The Eagles connect at 68.1 percent (109-160) at home and 73.8 percent (93-126) on the road.
 
Category: Home / Away
PPG: 71.8 / 63.9
D-PPG: 58.8 / 73.4
FG%: 47.4 / 42.0
D-FG%: 36.4 / 45.6
3-PT%: 37.0 / 35.3
RPG: 41.0 / 32.1
APG: 16.0 / 13.6
SPG: 5.7 / 5.0
 
HOME SUPPORT
FGCU has sold out 18 of its last 25 games, and through nine home games this year, FGCU has totaled 38,784 fans for an average of 4,309 (capacity: 4,333 + 300 standing-room only tickets) - representing 33 percent of the A-Sun's total home attendance (eight teams) of 118,097.
 
RE-TWEETS (5 More Things To Know In 140 Characters Or Less)
1) Brett Comer and Bernard Thompson are just 12 points shy of reaching 3,000 combined points for their careers.
2) With 14 wins, FGCU is tied with Miami (hosts Georgia Tech Wednesday night) for the most wins of any D-I team in the state of Florida.
3) Julian DeBose is the A-Sun Newcomer of the Week after tallying a season-high 18 points at USC Upstate and team-high-tying 12 at Kennesaw State.
4) Jamail Jones recorded his third double-double of the season and first since the first two games with 12 points and 10 rebounds at KSU.
5) FGCU is 2-6 this year when shooting worse than its opponents (both victories last weekend), and is 10-0 when out-rebounding its opponents.
 
ODDS & ENDS
DeBose (Washington, D.C./St. John College HS/Rice) has played the most minutes of any FGCU player in A-Sun action (166), and he leads the team in assist-to-turnover ratio in league games (4.7) … Thompson (Conyers, Ga./Rockdale County HS) grabbed a season-best nine rebounds in a season-high 39 minutes at Kennesaw State Saturday .. the Eagles shot just 32.1 percent (18-56) from the floor in the 54-48 win over Kennesaw State, its lowest shooting percentage in a win since defeating Campbell, 47-39, during the 2010-11 season (24.4 percent) … with six points against KSU, Comer (Winter Park, Fla./Winter Park HS) surpassed 2014 graduate Chase Fieler for third place on FGCU's career scoring list (1,307) … Nate Hicks (Panama City Beach, Fla./J.R. Arnold HS/Georgia Tech) has led FGCU in plus/minus each of the last two games.
 
A-SUN STATISTICAL RANKINGS
In A-Sun games, FGCU leads the league in points allowed (59.2 per game), field-goal percentage defense (37.4), rebound average (40.8) and steals (7 per game). On the year FGCU is shooting just 69.6 percent from the free-throw line, but in its five A-Sun games the Eagles are connecting at a 76.8-percent clip from the stripe – second in the league behind UNF (80.6 percent).
 
A-SUN FAVORITES
For the second-straight season, FGCU is the preseason league favorite to win the A-Sun, and the Eagles were a near-unanimous selection. FGCU garnered seven of the eight first-place votes in the coaches' poll (63 points), while it received 25 of 26 first-place votes in the media poll (207 points).
 
Thompson was named the A-Sun Preseason Player of the Year and the A-Sun Preseason Defensive Player of the Year – the first time in at least five years the same player has been recognized with both awards. Comer and Jones (Atlanta, Ga./Montverde Academy/Marquette) join Thompson on the A-Sun Preseason All-Conference Team as FGCU is the only school with two unanimous selections (Comer and Thompson), and is tied with the UNF for the most all-league selections with three.
 
THE ONLY ONE
FGCU is the only school in the Atlantic Sun Conference which has won an A-Sun Men's Basketball Championship. Conference re-alignment has drastically altered the landscape of collegiate athletics, and the A-Sun is no different. The Eagles joined the league in 2007-08 with USC Upstate, and prior to that North Florida and Kennesaw State both joined for the 2005-06 season. Lipscomb has been a member since 2003-04, Jacksonville since 1998-99 and Stetson since 1986-87. Northern Kentucky is in its third year in the A-Sun after joining in 2012-13 and has two years (including this season) of its NCAA-mandated Division-I reclassification period remaining.
 
A-STUN CONFERENCE
The Atlantic Sun Conference has been the talk of the college basketball world the last two postseasons as FGCU and Mercer (now a Southern Conference member) have both been responsible for three major upsets in the NCAA Tournament, affectionately turning the A-Sun into the A-Stun.
 
2013 NCAA Tournament: No. 15 FGCU 78 No. 2 Georgetown 68
2013 NCAA Tournament: No. 15 FGCU 81 No. 7 San Diego State 71
2014 NCAA Tournament: No. 14 Mercer 78 No. 3 Duke 71
 
DID YOU KNOW?
Thompson is the only active player (any division) with at least 1,600 career points (1,681), 500 career rebounds (554) and 240 career steals (244). Earlier this year the guard posted a D-I program-record 34-point performance in a victory over Ohio.
 
#DUNKCITY MAESTRO
With 137 assists on the year, Comer ranks seventh in the nation in total assists. Comer leads all active players in the NCAA (any division) with 746 career assists as the Dunk City orchestrator is already the A-Sun's career assist leader. Comer – who has been tabbed by ESPN as the country's seventh-best point guard – is third in the nation in assist rate at 46 percent (assists divided by the field goals made by the player's teammates while he is on the court).
 
CHALLENING NON-CONFERENCE SLATE
FGCU completed a challenging non-conference schedule in which it defeated four 20-win opponents from a season ago (UC Santa Barbara, Ohio, San Francisco, Massachusetts) and another (South Dakota State) which won 19 contests. Four of FGCU's six losses came to teams ranked in the top-90 of the current RPI (three in the top-65). After getting off to 8-1 and 9-2 starts, FGCU lost four of its final five games in the 16-game non-league docket. However, due to injuries and suspensions, the Eagles only had a full roster for four non-conference games (South Dakota State, Florida Tech, UMass, FIU). FGCU's current RPI of 141 is by far the best in the Atlantic Sun Conference, with North Florida (187) being the next-closest team.
 
#DEPTHCITY
FGCU had five different leading scorers in the first eight games this year. The Eagles have 10 players averaging at least 11 minutes per game (only two (Thompson and DeBose) who play more than 30 minutes per outing) and boast five players averaging at least 8.2 points per game (four double-figure scorers) and seven players who are averaging at least three rebounds per game.

THE MOST PROLIFIC SENIOR BACKCOURT IN COLLEGE BASKETBALL
Thompson and Comer are not only the best backcourt in the A-Sun but also one of the best in the nation, and based on the following numbers the best senior backcourt duo in all of D-I basketball. No other senior backcourt duo has combined to produce more stats than the following (with the exception of points):
 
Points: 2,988
Leaders: 3,048 by Saah Nimley & Arlon Harper (Charleston Southern)
Assists: 68
Next closest: 889 by Raheem Appleby & Kenneth Smith (Louisiana Tech)
Games Played: 247
Next closest: 235 by Traevon Jackson & Josh Gasser (Wisconsin)
Games Started: 240
Next closest: 206 by Traevon Jackson & Josh Gasser (Wisconsin)
Minutes: 7,239
Next closest: 6,694 by Traevon Jackson & Josh Gasser (Wisconsin)
 
THOMPSON
Points: 1,681 – A-Sun active career leader, 20th on the all-time conference scoring list and tops on the FGCU program career scoring record. If Thompson scores 605 points (20 points per game over the regular season), he would become only the eighth player in A-Sun history (first season: 1978-79) to reach 2,000 career points. The A-Sun career scoring record is held by Willie Jackson (2,535) who played for former league member Centenary from 1980-84. Thompson is currently 15th among all active D-I players for career points. He needs 11 points to surpass E.J. Gordon (Stetson, 2003-06) for 19th place on the A-Sun all-time scoring list.
 
Steals: 244 – Fourth among all active D-I players, Thompson is already FGCU's program career leader, and needs just 16 more thefts this year to own the A-Sun career record (259), currently held by Vaughn Williams who played at former league member Arkansas-Little Rock from 1980-83. Williams is the only player in the history of the A-Sun who has more steals than Thompson.
 
COMER
Assists: 746 – Comer is five assists ahead of his next closest active competitor (Louisiana Tech's Kenneth Smith, 741). Of the 125 career games he has played in, Comer has led FGCU in assists 113 times.
 
GROWING UP QUICKLY
Despite only becoming D-I postseason eligible in the 2011-12 season, FGCU has already claimed an impressive nine wins in the postseason.
 
7-2: Atlantic Sun Conference Tournament
FGCU is the only school in D-I history to reach the championship game of its conference tournament in each of its first three seasons of eligibility. The Eagles went 2-1 in 2012 (lost to Belmont), 3-0 in 2013 (defeated Mercer) and 2-1 in 2014 (lost to Mercer).
 
2-1: NCAA Tournament
FGCU became the first school in NCAA history to reach the Sweet Sixteen as a No. 15 seed in 2013 when the Eagles defeated No. 2 Georgetown and No. 7 San Diego State en route to captivating the nation and earning the #DunkCity moniker. The Green and Blue lost to No. 3 Florida in the next round.
 
0-1: NIT
FGCU won the program's first A-Sun regular-season championship in 2014 courtesy of a 14-4 league mark. The Eagles received a No. 8 seed in the NIT and traveled to No. 1 Florida State, falling just short (58-53) to the eventual NIT semifinalists.
 
AMONG THE NATION'S ELITE
For the second-consecutive year FGCU was selected by ESPN for inclusion in the worldwide leader's Midnight Madness coverage when the Eagles hosted Dunk City After Dark on Oct. 17. With that honor, FGCU joined only four other extremely tradition-rich programs which can boast that claim: Kansas, Kentucky, Syracuse and UConn.
 
NEXT UP
FGCU continues its home A-Sun weekend when it welcomes Northern Kentucky to The Nest for a 7 p.m. tipoff on Saturday, Jan. 31. The game is nearly completely sold out already, and if students do not claim their entire allotment before 5 p.m. on Friday, some of their tickets will be made available for the general public to purchase. At halftime, Sale will become the first FGCU student-athlete to have a jersey retired as his No. 41 will be honored.
 
FOLLOW ALONG
General-admission tickets for all FGCU men's basketball games at Alico Arena are still available and can be purchased by logging on to FGCUAthletics.com/Tickets, in person at the Alico Arena Ticket Office or over the phone at 239-590-7145. For up-to-the-minute information and behind-the-scenes access to the men's basketball program, follow @FGCU_MBB on Twitter and Instagram, and "Like" us on Facebook at /FGCUMBB.
 
COACH DOOLEY 
FGCU is led by second-year head coach Joe Dooley, who coached three all-conference selections during his first season and guided FGCU to its first Atlantic Sun Conference Regular-Season Championship and first trip to the NIT. Prior to arriving in SWFL, Dooley spent 10 seasons as an assistant at Kansas under head coach Bill Self. During those 10 seasons, Kansas produced 300 wins, nine straight Big 12 regular-season titles, six Big 12 Tournament championships, six NCAA Sweet 16s, five NCAA Elite Eight appearances and two Final Fours, including the 2008 National Championship.
 
SUPPORT THE CAUSE 
FGCU Athletics sponsors events throughout the year to benefit the FGCU Campus Food Pantry (www.fgcu.edu/foodpantry) and the Harry Chapin Food Bank (www.harrychapinfoodbank.org), FGCU Athletics' charities of choice. For more information, including how to make a contribution, please visitwww.fgcu.edu/foodpantry and utilize the hashtag #FeedFGCU to help raise awareness.