LAKE CHARLES – McNeese will play five of its final seven regular season basketball games at home beginning on Saturday against Northwestern State as the push towards the Southland Conference Tournament speeds up.
 
Tip-off is slated for 3 p.m. at Burton Coliseum or 30 following a women's game that starts at 1 between the two teams.
 
The Cowboys (9-13, 3-8 SLC) have dropped their last two games on the road at UNO and Nicholls, two games that saw the Pokes struggle through several scoring droughts that played a big factor in the end results. McNeese has yet to put a complete game together and is hoping a win on Saturday will get the Cowboys heading in the right direction at just the right time.
 
"We've got to come out ready to play, especially against a team like Northwestern State," said head coach Dave Simmons. "We have shown signs of being a really good team. We just cannot have any lulls like we did the last couple of games.
 
"We still haven't played a full 40 minutes this year. When we can do that, we're a pretty good team."
 
At Nicholls, McNeese led 27-24 at the half after rolling off 11 straight points, but the Colonels responded in the second half to scored 14 straight to start the frame while holding the Cowboys scoreless in the first 3:49 and taking a 10-point lead.
 
Head coach Dave Simmons sat the starting five for the next three minutes after that slump and the first score of the second half from a starter didn't occur until the 12:48 mark when Keelan Garrett hit a jumper. McNeese went on to lose by a 70-59 score.
 
Two days later, the play was much the same. McNeese led UNO by 5 points with just over eight minutes to play in the first half but hit only two field goals in the final 8:08 and was outscored by a 15-5 margin in that span as UNO built a 35-30 lead.
 
In the second half, a frame that was dominated by Desharick Guidry's 18 points in the 20 minutes played, that stat would be the only high point for the Cowboys who led 52-47 with 11:37 to play but then went 3:02 without a point and the Privateers eventually tied the game at 62-62 with 5:06 to play. The next 3:39 saw zero points scored from McNeese while UNO outscored the Cowboys 19-9 in the final 5:06 to take the 81-71 win.
 
"We have to have guys come out hard and ready to play from the start," said Simmons. "We can't afford to get into these slumps against anybody. I can promise you Northwestern is going to come in here ready to put some points on the board."
 
NSU (12-10, 7-4 SLC) will come into Burton ranked No. 2 in the nation in scoring offense at 84.5 points per game but ranked 344^th out of 345 teams in scoring defense after giving up 83.6 points per contest. The Demons have held just three opponents under 70 points on the season with one of those being McNeese in their 93-67 win over the Cowboys on Jan. 24.
 
Saturday's game will feature three of the league's top four scorers in NSU's Zeke Woodley (2^nd, 22.1 ppg) and Jalan West (3^rd, 18.8 ppg), as well as McNeese's Desharick Guidry (4^th, 17.4 ppg).
 
The scoring tandem Woodley and West ranks atop the nation with a combined average of 40.9 points scored between the two.
 
West and McNeese's Kevin Hardy are two of the most athletic and all-around players in the league. Hardy is second in the league in steals per game (2.5) followed closely by West who is third with a 2.1 average. West tops the conference with 7.2 assists while Hardy is eighth with a 4.0 mark. Hardy is also seventh in rebounding (6.6), 10^th in blocked shots (1.0), and 17^th in scoring (12.6).
 
McNeese holds a slight edge in the all-time series by a 60-56 mark but the Demons have won the last four outings. The Cowboys' last win over NSU will come almost three years to the date when they posted a 70-61 win on Feb. 13, 2012 in Natchitoches.