GAME NOTES

RALEIGH, North Carolina – Just a few hours after the McNeese basketball team landed at Charlotte International Airport for its Thursday night basketball game against North Carolina State, the team embraced a "once in a lifetime" opportunity after it witnessed the Charlotte Hornets rally to beat the Los Angeles Lakers.
 
Hornets' head coach Steve Clifford greeted the team in his office then took the entire squad on a grand tour of the Spectrum Center facilities that included stops in the team meeting/dining hall, practice court and locker room.
 
It was at the practice court where Coach Clifford, now in his fourth season at the helm of the Hornets, his first head coaching job in the NBA after being an assistant coach for 13 years with the New York Knicks, Houston Rockets, Orlando Magic, and most recently the Lakers, spoke sincerely and emotionally about the game of basketball to the Cowboy players and staff, hitting on topics such as playing with energy and playing unselfishly.
 
Those two characteristics are the main reason the Cowboys snapped a four-game losing streak on Monday night in a 70-63 win at Tulane.
 
"You have to play with some emotion and a lot of excitement," said Clifford to the team. "You play so many games in a short of amount of time so it's easy to get complacent. Once you do that, you've lost your will. Play as a team. Move the ball around. Unselfish players make winning teams."
 
"It was great having Coach Clifford talk to the kids," said head coach Dave Simmons. "Mainly because he was telling them the exact same thing we tell them every day. But it's different coming from a NBA coach. Maybe it'll sink in better."
 
The Cowboys got an extra surprise when visiting the locker room and a chance to talk to former 1^st round draft pick Kemba Walker who is currently one of the top point guards in the NBA.
 
The Cowboys (3-7) will be hoping to take that inspiring, unforgettable night into Thursday's 6 p.m. (CT) game against a Wolfpack team that seems to be running on all cylinders behind one of the best players in the country in freshman guard Dennis Smith who averages 18.5 points and 5.5 assists per game.
 
Smith is projected to be a NBA Lottery Pick after this season.
 
Three other players who are projected to start also average double-digits – Terry Henderson (17.4), Torin Dorn (15.5) and Abdul-Malik Abu (12.0).
 
McNeese is expected to stick with the lineup it has the last two ball games that has brought the team some success – Jamaya Burr, Jarren Greenwood, Lance Potier, LaBarrius Hill and Stephen Ugochukwu.
 
Ugochukwu is coming off a career night at Tulane where he tied a career-best with 19 points while grabbing 14 rebounds, the most in his career. He's currently ranked fifth in the Southland Conference with 7.7 rebounds per game and in the last three games he's played since returning from injury, is averaging a double-double (12 points and 11.7 rebounds).
 
Burr continues to lead the team in scoring (11.7) while Greenwood is sinking 11.3 per contest. Kalob Ledoux is coming off the bench to score just under 11 per game and will go into Thursday's game with a hot hand, having made 11 of 18 3-point baskets in the last four games.
 
Thursday's game will be the fifth time McNeese will have played a team from the Atlantic Coast Conference (0-4 record) and first since visiting the North Carolina Tarheels back in December of 2012.
 
After this game, the Cowboys will take a few days off for Christmas before getting back to work to prepare for Southland Conference action that gets started on Dec. 31 at Northwestern State.