Alcorn State at Texas Southern, 8:30 PM Eastern, tsusports.com
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The regular season title in the SWAC and top seed in the conference tournament may be decided in Houston tonight as the red-hot Alcorn State Braves are in town to battle the Texas Southern Tigers. Entering play tonight, Texas Southern has a one game lead in the conference standings at 14-2 (18-11 overall). Alcorn State (13-3, 16-11) can move into a tie with one game to go for both teams if they pick up the road win. Texas Southern, with the victory, would clinch the regular season championship. If both teams finish tied at the end of the season (Texas Southern hosts Southern on Saturday while Alcorn State travels to Prairie View), the tiebreaker will come down to point differential in the two games between the teams, meaning that Alcorn State would need to win by three or more points tonight to have a shot at winning the title through a tiebreaker.
Texas Southern is coming off a 10 point road win on Monday night at Alabama A&M. Demontrae Jefferson led the Tigers in that win with 23 points. Keep an eye on Zach Lofton as well, as he has scored in double figures in every conference game so far. Alcorn State is the hottest team in the SWAC and one of the hottest in the entire nation, having won 11 straight games entering play tonight. AJ Mosby had 19 points and 7 rebounds in their one point road win at Southern over the weekend. Reginal Johnson has been a key to the winning streak as well, including a double-double last week against Alabama A&M. For Alcorn State, winning the regular season championship and taking a shot at the SWAC tournament title is their entire season, as an APR ban has them ineligible for the Big Dance this year. Should they win the SWAC tourney, the team they defeat in the finals would receive the league’s automatic bid.