MEN'S BASKETBALL: Injuries continue to plague season
Instead, the game served as an excellent sedative for late-night sports junkies and probably gave MTV's "Love Lines" a small ratings boost. Watching the game was about as fun as going to a Harlem Globetrotters' game and rooting for the opposing Washington Generals.
The combination of Tulsa's tenacious defense and Rice's 23 percent shooting from the field resulted in a 65-33 romp over the Owls. It is not often that a school's football team scores more points against a foe than their basketball team does, but that was the case here (Rice beat Tulsa 42-14 this season in football).
By overplaying the passing lanes and denying the pass to the wing, Rice could not get into any type of offense and was forced into 27 turnovers. Rice jumped out to an early 8-4 lead, but could only manage 5 more points the entire half, falling to a 24-13 deficit in the first half.
Things would get worse for the team in the second half, as Tulsa benefited from the play of All-American guard Shea Seals' 20 points to pull away from Rice.
The Owls entered the season with high expectations, returning a solid nucleus from last year's team, as well as adding the talents of junior guard Bobby Crawford and junior forward Jarvis Sanni. Rice was anxiously awaiting its first year of WAC basketball and was also harboring hopes of postseason play.
But for the third consecutive year, injuries have decimated the Owls. Two weeks before the season was set to begin, star guard Crawford went down with a broken ankle. Junior forward Jesse Cravens, who sat out all of last year with back problems, saw his basketball career come to an end after a second slipped disk in his back sidelined him. Sophomore point guard Chad Michael is also out for the entire season with back problems. Sophomore forward T.J. Armstrong and senior center Shaun Igo have both missed time this season with injuries as well. As if these problems weren't bad enough, almost every player on the team suffered from the flu during a six-game road swing in December.
Rice started the season with two convincing home victories over Houston Baptist University and the Colorado School of Mines. In these two games, the Owls looked unstoppable, knocking down three-pointers and dominating the paint.
From there, the team traveled to Tallahassee, Fla., where the Florida State University Seminoles crushed the Owls 79-54 to hand Rice their first loss of the season.
Then the flu bug hit. What remained of the once healthy team lost their next two games to Princeton University and St. Bon-aventure University but was able to even out their record at 3-3 with a win in the consolation game of the First Bank Classic versus Prairie View A&M University.
After taking two weeks off for finals, the Owls lost in a hard-fought overtime battle to the University of North Texas, 64-62. T.J. Atkins of UNT won the game with a buzzer-beater to send the Owls home for Christmas with a 3-4 record.
Dec. 28 marked the return of Crawford to the lineup. Although Crawford was nowhere near 100 percent healthy, he scored 27 points in only 28 minutes to lead Rice to a 78-59 win over Southern.
After ending their six-game road trip, the team returned to Autry Court to defeat the United States Naval Academy 69-52. Igo lead the way with 17 points as Rice climbed to a 5-4 winning record.
In their next game, the Owls evened their mark against Ivy League schools at 1-1 as they defeated the University of Pennsylvania 70-63. Once again, Igo was the star of the game, scoring 26 points. These two performances earned Igo the title of WAC Mountain Division Player of the Week. Rice ended their non-conference schedule with a 6-4 record.
To open WAC play, Head Coach Jerry Tarkanian and his Fresno State University Bulldogs came to town. The Owls had to play their first conference game without the services of Igo due to an ankle sprain. Despite a late flurry of three-pointers by Rice, Fresno State won the game 79-76. This game, combined with Monday night's loss to Tulsa evened Rice's record at 6-6.
Going into Monday night's game, Crawford was leading the team in scoring at 18.5 points per game. Igo and Sanni were next at 15.3 and 11.1 points per game, respectively. Igo had the rebounding lead at 8.2 per game.
Rice continues with WAC games this week with home games versus University of Texas at El Paso on Thursday and the University of New Mexico on Saturday. With 14 regular season games to go and the WAC postseason tournament, anything is still possible for the Owls.
This item appeared in the Sports section of the January 17, 1997 issue.
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