KIRKSVILLE, Mo.—Last week the Truman Men's Basketball team defended their home court with victories over Missouri S&T and Maryville to push their record to 8-5 and their GLVC record to 4-1. The challenge gets tougher this week as they take on 9-4 Illinois Springfield and 8-5 Lewis.
Brodric Thomas remains in second place in the conference in scoring with an average of 21.2 points per game, just .6 away from catching Lindenwood's T.J. Crockett. Thomas also ranks 11^th in the GLVC in rebounds with 6.7 boards per game, and has now moved into a tie for 14^th in blocks with .85. He joins Alex McQuinn in the top 15 in the conference in blocked shots.
The Bulldogs defense has been stellar of late, and with that the team has moved up to sixth in the GLVC in field goal defense—allowing opponents to shoot just 42.1% from the field. Truman has also moved up to fifth in the conference in points allowed with 67.4.
Truman has also getting contributions from their freshmen: as Dylan Peeters set his season high in points against Maryville with 12 and rebounds against S&T with eight while Sam Nissen tied his career high against Maryville with six points.
 
The Opponents:
Illinois Springfield will have multiple Truman ties coming back to Kirksville, as head coach Matt Brock was a four year letter winner for the Bulldogs from 2002-2006 and was a team captain during the 2006 run to the NCAA Tournament. Assistant coach Pat Sodemann was an assistant on Jeff Horner's staff last season, and spent two years at Truman before finishing his playing career at Illinois Wesleyan. Sodemann also worked with Brock at Missouri Baptist.
The Prairie Stars are deadly from beyond the arc as they average 12.5 three pointers per game. Five players have already made 20 or more treys this season—led by Jesus Castillo with 46. Daniel Soetan leads the team in points per game with 17.6 and rebounds with 7.1 per game.
Lewis enters the week with a mark of 8-5, as Truman does. They are led by Anthony D'Avanzo who holds the top mark on the team in points per game with 14 and rebounds with 7.4. He also is tied for the team lead in blocked shots with eight. The Flyers are tied with Truman in scoring defense, allowing 67.4 points per game. Through five conference games Lewis is 3-2 in GLVC play, defeating Illinois Springfield, Rockhurst and William Jewell while falling at #11 Indianapolis 82-67 and to #1 Bellarmine 56-50.
 
Up next:
The Bulldogs will be on the road for three games in one week—starting at Quincy on Monday then followed by Southern Indiana on Thursday (both games with a 7:30 tip) and concluding with McKendree Saturday (3 o'clock tip).