Game Notes (PDF) I Video I Audio I Stats I Tickets

Portland Pilots (11-16, 5-9) vs Saint Mary's Gaels (20-4, 11-3)
Date: Thursday, Feb. 18, 2016
Tip-off: 7:00 p.m.
Location: Portland, Ore.
Arena: Chiles Center (4,852)
Video: TheW.tv
Radio: 910 ESPN-Portland (KMTT)
Live Stats: PortlandPilots.com

POR vs. SMC All-Time Series
Overall: 30-61
At POR: 21-23
At SMC: 7-35
Neutral: 2-3
Last 1: SMC 89, POR 74 (Jan. 23 at Saint Mary's)

THIS WEEK
• Portland will play its final two home games of the 2016 season as the Pilots welcome Saint Mary's and Pacific to the Chiles Center.
• The Pilots and Gaels meet on Thursday at 7 p.m., while the Tigers visit on Saturday at 7 p.m. Saturday will be Senior Day as the Pilots will recognize Bryce Pressley and Max Livingston prior to tip-off.

TICKET INFORMATION
• Tickets can be purchased through all Ticketmaster outlets or at the door. Tickets for Thursday start at $12 for adults and $6 for kids. Saturday's game pricing starts at $10 for adults and $5 for kids.
• Mini packs and group packs are still available for the 2015-16 season. Click here for ticket package options and pricing.
 
PROMOTIONS
• Saturday's game will feature BrewFest in the Chiles Center Plaza from 5-7 p.m., as well has a halftime paper airplane toss to win accommodations for two to Hawaii.
• Portland's all-you-can-eat Pregame Pasta Feed will be incorporated into the BrewFest area and admission is $8 and includes pasta, salad, desserts and beverages.
• The Pilot Club space on the south mezzanine will open one hour prior to tip-off and remain open during the game through the 12-minute mark of the second half. Pilot Club members will have open access to the space and will receive one free beverage of choice per game. A Pilot Club Gameday Pass is available for $5 for non-Pilot Club members. The pass will include one free drink token that can be used for beer or soda on that date. The space will be open to all ages and have beverage service start-to-finish. Re-entry will be allowed throughout the game and snacks will be provided after tip-off.
• For a complete list of promotional events for the upcoming season, click here.

GAME COVERAGE
• Thursday's game will be broadcast on TheW.tv with Travis Demers and Bill Krueger calling the action.
• All Pilot games are on the radio on the home of the Pilots, 910 ESPN-Portland (KMTT) with a 30-minute pregame show and Jason Swygard calling the action.
• Online audio and live stats will be available at PortlandPilots.com.

ABOUT THE PILOTS
• The Pilots (11-16, 5-9 WCC) followed a road sweep of Pepperdine and LMU with last week's 92-66 loss to Gonzaga at the Chiles Center.
• Junior F Jarrel Marshall scored a career-high 25 points in the loss as Gonzaga caught fire and made 15-of-26 three-pointers.
• Junior PG Alec Wintering added 11 points and was previously named the WCC Player of the Week after leading the Pilots to wins at Pepperdine and LMU. Wintering has twice earned the league's weekly honor this season.
• Wintering recorded his 1,000th career point earlier this year at Saint Mary's to become the 38th player in school history to accomplish the feat. Senior G Bryce Pressley is four points shy of his 1,000th career point as well.
• A three-year starter and Preseason All-WCC selection, Wintering is second in the WCC in steals (1.7), fourth in scoring (18.7) and fifth in assists (5.4). His 21.6 points per game in WCC play ranks second behind Gonzaga's Kyle Wiltjer.
• Portland is 23rd nationally in three-pointers made per game (9.3). The Pilots lead the WCC in three-pointers made and rank second in steals (6.9), turnover margin (+1.6) and blocked shots (4.1).
• Portland is attempting 25.1 three-pointers per game, including 40 against Colorado State. That broke the previous Pilot single-game record of 34 attempts.
• Portland has played up-tempo basketball and attempted 80 field goals against UC Davis, the most since the team hoisted 84 on Nov. 25, 2001 against Duke.
• Coach Eric Reveno has a deep bench with nine players averaging 11 or more minutes.
• Pressley, also a three-year starter, is averaging a career-best 13.4 points per game, including 30 in the season opener versus Oregon Tech.
• Reveno returns seven lettermen from a 2014-15 squad that finished 17-16 overall and earned an invitation to the CollegeInsider.com Postseason Tournament. 

ABOUT SAINT MARY'S
• The Gaels (20-4, 11-3 WCC) sit alone in second place in the league standings following a home split last week. Saint Mary's dropped a 69-63 decision to Pepperdine on Thursday, its first home loss of the season. The Gaels then defeated LMU 68-62 on Saturday.
• Six Gaels are averaging nine or more points per game as Saint Mary's is one of the most efficient offensive teams in the nation.
• The Gaels lead the nation in field goal percentage (.510), assist-to-turnover ratio (1.8), are third in scoring margin (+15.7) and fifth in scoring defense (59.8).
• Head coach Randy Bennett is in his 15th year at the helm and has led the Gaels to five NCAA and four NIT appearances in the last decade.
• Saint Mary's defeated the Pilots 89-74 earlier this year in Moraga and swept the regular season series last year, but Portland came away with a 69-52 win in the 2015 WCC Tournament quarterfinals.
 
WINTERING RACKS UP THE ACCOLADES
• Alec Wintering has had a remarkable season and continues to establish himself as one of Portland's all-time greats.
• He picked up his second WCC Player of the Week award on Feb. 8 and also earned CollegeSportsMadness.com National Player of the Week and the CollegeCourtReport.com National Mid-Major Player of the Week. CollegeInsider.com's Angela Lento also named Wintering to her weekly top five performance list among all mid-majors. He averaged 24.5 points, 7.0 rebounds and 6.5 assists in UP's road sweep that week.
• The Charlotte, N.C. native scored a career-high 34 points against Pepperdine on Dec. 23 to earn WCC Player of the Week honors. That was followed by erupting for 31 points, four rebounds, four assists and zero turnovers against San Francisco on Dec. 31.
• It marked the first time a Pilot ever recorded back-to-back 30-point games.
• Wintering was a perfect 15-of-15 from the free throw line against USF, falling one short of the school record for free throws without a miss in a single game (Rick Raivio, 16-16, Jan. 5, 1980 vs. San Francisco).
• He scored 13 points on Jan. 23 at Saint Mary's to become the 38th player in school history to score 1,000 or more points.
• Wintering's 21.6 points per game in WCC play is second overall.
• He is No. 2 all-time for UP in assists per game (5.2), No. 4 in three-point percentage (.423), No. 5 in total assists (454) and No. 7 in steals (137).

MARSHALL BREAKS OUT
• Junior F Jarrel Marshall had a breakout weekend in Southern California and then continued his great play with a career-high 25 points against Gonzaga on Thursday.
• The Palm Beach State JC transfer recorded his first double-double of the season and finished with 14 points and a career-high 12 rebounds at Pepperdine on Feb. 4. He also blocked the potential game-tying three-pointer at the buzzer.
• Marshall then finished with 13 points, eight rebounds, five assists and four blocked shots on Saturday at LMU.
• He carried that momentum into a 25-point performance against Gonzaga, including 11-of-18 from the field.

TYSON PROVIDES INSTANT OFFENSE
• Sophomore G D'Marques Tyson has started the last five games and is averaging 17.0 points per game over the last eight contests.
• Tyson is averaging 4.4 threes made per game during his hot run, hitting 37-of-72 (.514) from beyond the arc.
• He erupted for a career-high 27 points in his first career start against San Francisco, including eight three-pointers.
• Tyson leads the Pilots and ranks second in the WCC with 2.8 threes made per game. That averaged has jumped to a league-leading 3.4 per game in WCC play.
• He has now drained four or more three-pointers 10 times this season.
• His 22.2 points per 40 minutes are second on the Pilot roster to Wintering (23.8).
• Perhaps most impressive has been Tyson's improvement in other areas. He was the primary defender against BYU's Kyle Collinsworth as the Pilots held him to 10 points on 4-of-17 shooting. He then grabbed a career-high eight rebounds at LMU.

PRESSLEY IMPRESSES
• Senior G Bryce Pressley opened the year with a career-high 30 points and eight three-pointers against Oregon Tech. He also scorched LMU with seven three-pointers and 25 points and followed with 15 points and 4-of-5 from beyond the arc against Pepperdine.
• The son of former Villanova NCAA Champion and NBA guard Harold Pressley, Bryce is closing in on becoming the 39th 1,000-point scorer in program history. He currently has 996 career points, but his value has been in his versatility.
• Pressley ranks seventh in UP history in three-pointers made (145), ninth in three-point percentage (.395), 12th in assists (300), tied for 13th in career steals (111) and 20th in blocked shots (44).

FREE THROW STRUGGLES SUBSIDE
• Portland entered its Dec. 31 game at San Francisco shooting just 64.3 percent from the free throw line as a team.
• The Pilots made their first 17 attempts of the game and finished 25-of-28 overall. UP now is second in the league in free throw percentage in WCC games (.768).
• Alec Wintering was shooting a career-low 67 percent entering the USF game, but now sits at 77.5 percent.

JOHNSON SOLIDIFIES ROLE
• Freshman PG Jazz Johnson scored a season high 22 points against San Francisco on Dec. 31, eclipsing his previous high of 14 scored against Oregon Tech in the season opener.
• He has carried that momentum into more minutes as WCC play has progressed averaging 7.0 points and posting a 1.4 assist-to-turnover ratio in league play.
• Johnson was a high-scoring prep player out of Lake Oswego High School in Lake Oswego, Ore. He broke the prestigious Les Schwab Invitational tournament scoring record by averaging 35.0 points per game over four games.

THREE-POINT THREATS
• Portland drilled 15 three-pointers at LMU on Feb. 6, tying the season-high established against Alcorn State and one shy of the program record set against Idaho on Dec. 20, 2009.
• The Pilots rank 23rd nationally in threes per game (9.3).
• Portland was the best three-point shooting team in the nation over a three-year period from 2009-11. That stretch included 2010 NCAA Three-Point Champion Jared Stohl and Pilot career three-point percentage leader T.J. Campbell.

LATE GAME STRUGGLES
• The Pilots have struggled to close out games all season. Portland tied the game at Pacific four times on Jan. 21 and had nine possessions with a chance to tie or take the lead come up empty.
• Portland led by 15 late at San Francisco on Dec. 31, but went scoreless over the final 3:40 as the Dons were able to pull away. The Pilots then led 61-60 with 8:06 left at Santa Clara Jan. 2, but went just 2-for-14 from the field the rest of the game in the loss.
• The Pilots had two shots to win before the buzzer in an 80-79 loss to Southern Illinois at the Corpus Christi Coastal Classic, but both missed.
• Idaho State got a tip-in in the closing seconds for a 66-65 win over the Pilots, while Weber State hit contested three-pointer with 0.8 seconds left in regulation to force overtime, which they would go on to win by a 92-82 margin.
• Portland also was tied with Boise State with 5:15 remaining, but suffered a nearly four-minute scoring drought in the 81-71 loss.

FAMILIAR FACES ON THE BENCH
• Head Coach Eric Reveno picked up a pair of his former players to join the coaching staff this offseason. Mitch Johnson, a former Stanford point guard, comes on as an assistant coach, while former Pilot center Kramer Knutson also joined the staff as director of basketball operations.

PILOTS SIGN LOCAL CENTER TO NLI
• Portland announced that 6-10 center Joseph Smoyer (Portland, Ore./Franklin HS) signed a National Letter of Intent and will join the Pilots next season.
• Smoyer has started for the Quakers each of the last three seasons earning All-Portland Interscholastic League First Team honors last season. He was honorable mention all-league in both his freshman and sophomore seasons.
• Smoyer joins previous signee Alec Monson to comprise the Class of 2016. Monson signed in 2014 and will return from a two-year church mission next season.
• An elite student, Smoyer is currently the senior class President and a has been admitted to the University of Portland Shiley School of Engineering.

PILOTS REMEMBER LONGTIME RADIO ANNOUNCER, BILL JOHNSON
• Bill Johnson, the radio play-by-play voice of the University of Portland's men's basketball program for 23 years, died of heart failure on Sunday, Nov. 29 at the age of 71.
• A memorial service in Bill's honor took place on Tuesday, Jan. 5 at the Chapel of Christ the Teacher on the UP campus. The entire Pilots team, coaching staff, school administrators, family and friends paid their respects.
• His distinguished broadcasting career spanned six decades and included various radio and TV positions in the Portland market. He served as the basketball play-by-play voice at various times throughout his career with the Oregon, Linfield, Lewis & Clark and Sonoma State. He also was with the Portland Trail Blazers from 1974-76. Johnson's football play-by-play experience included time with Oregon, Portland State and Lewis & Clark College and most recently with Linfield College.
• Johnson had three stints with the Pilots, first with the 1977-78 team and then a 16-year run from 1986-01 which included Portland's run to the 1996 NCAA Tournament. He re-joined the Pilots for the last six seasons.

PILOTS ANNOUNCE PARTNERSHIP WITH COMCAST SPORTSNET
• Portland and Comcast SportsNet announced a partnership that will televise eight upcoming Pilot events, including the Jan. 28 men's basketball game versus San Francisco.
• Three women's basketball games and four baseball games will also be aired.
• This is in addition to the monthly 30-minute show, 'Portside with the Pilots' which showcases student-athlete profiles, alumni spotlights, top plays, and behind-the-scenes access to Pilot Athletics.
• All episodes are archived at YouTube.com/PortlandPilots.

PILOTS INK MULTI-YEAR DEAL WITH 910 ESPN-PORTLAND
• Portland and Entercom Portland, LLC will continue their men's basketball partnership for the 2015-16 and 2016-17 seasons on 910 ESPN-Portland (KMTT). In addition to live coverage of all exhibition, regular season, and postseason games, a weekly one-hour Portland Pilots Basketball Show featuring head coach Eric Reveno will be produced every Monday night at 7 p.m. throughout the basketball season.