PREVIEW: Men’s Basketball wraps up three-game road swing at UVA Wise

WISE, Va. – The Catawba College men's basketball team visits the high country to conclude its early slate of road games in South Atlantic Conference play, matching up with the Highland Cavaliers of UVA Wise on Tuesday at 7:30 p.m.

Knocking off No. 24

- Committing just four turnovers and out-rebounding 24th-ranked Carson-Newman on Saturday, the blue and white got their first road win of the season in 86-76 fashion

- Maintaining advantages in points off turnovers (28-5) and second-chance points (19-3) were critical for Catawba who remained dominant on the offensive boards with 16 rebounds

- Montraivis White poured in a career-high 25 points as Ibra Athie put up 20 and Nick Walker added 10 to round out the double-figure scorers

- Slotted 11th in the nation for efficiency, the Eagles remained productive at 52 percent shooting, but sheer volume caused by an 18-4 turnover margin bolstered Catawba's output

Athie Double-Double

- The redshirt junior forward torched Carson-Newman on the wing with season-high tallies of 20 points and 13 rebounds in his first start as a Catawba Indian

- Seven of Athie's boards were on the offensive end to produce 10 second-chance points

- The double-double is Catawba's second of the year following Walker's 15-point, 12-board performance in the season opener win over Lander

- No stranger to achieving double-double status, Athie averaged 15.0 points and 10.7 rebounds at IU East last year featuring a monster day against IU East when he collected 32 points and 18 boards

Stat Leaderboard

- Kris Robinson currently leads Catawba in scoring with 13.6 points per game followed by seven more players averaging between eight and 10 points

- The most efficient player on the floor has been Walker who holds a 65.7 percent clip from the field while dropping in a team-high 4.6 buckets per contest

- Athie and Walker are one-two in SAC offensive rebounding standings, averaging 3.2 and 3.0, respectively, while combining for 14 boards on a per-game basis

- White has put up 3.8 assists and 2.8 steals per affair as his 14 takeaways top the conference

All-Time Series

- Catawba is 7-1 against UVA Wise with a 4-1 record behind enemy lines

- The last five contests have gone to Catawba featured by four double-digit point wins; the meeting on Feb. 26, 2022 went to overtime as Ben Bowen and Michael Hueitt, Jr. shined down the stretch to pull out a 92-89 triumph

- Three of the previous four contests occurred in Wise with last season's affair ending 85-67 as Catawba had 12 different scorers including White who had nine points and five assists

Scouting the Highland Cavaliers

- UVA Wise has a 3-2 record coming off a win over Emory & Henry and loss to Coker last week after receiving votes in the NABC Coaches' Poll

- On Nov. 16, the Cavs upset No. 9 North Georgia on the road behind three double-figure scorers and an 11-assist showing from Bradley Dean in a wire-to-wire victory

- The 2023 SAC Player of the Year, Dean leads UVA Wise with 17.8 points and 5.8 assists per game, scoring double-digit points in each game while topping out at 26 vs. Emory & Henry

- Lav Cvetkovic' paced the Cavs with 25 points against Coker on Saturday, standing second in per-game points at 15.2

- On the boards, Evan Ramsey is nearly averaging a double-double as the redshirt freshman has marks of 11.8 points and 9.2 points as well as 1.8 blocks

Follow Along

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