Marshall faces Rice in CUSA tourney

No. 11 seed Rice (13-18, 8-10) vs. No. 6 seed Marshall (18-13, 11-7)

Conference USA Conference Tourney First Round, Ford Center at The Star, Frisco, Texas; Wednesday, 9 p.m. EDT

BOTTOM LINE: Rice is set to match up against Marshall in the first round of the CUSA tourney. The only regular season meeting came on Feb. 9, when the Owls shot 40.7 percent from the field while holding Marshall’s shooters to just 32.3 percent en route to the five-point victory.

SUPER SENIORS: Marshall’s Jon Elmore, C.J. Burks and Rondale Watson have combined to account for 56 percent of the team’s scoring this season and have scored 52 percent of all Thundering Herd points over the last five games.

MIGHTY MARTIN: Robert Martin has connected on 41.4 percent of the 111 3-pointers he’s attempted and has made 7 of 17 over his last five games. He’s also made 73.9 percent of his free throws this season.

WINLESS WHEN: Marshall is 0-8 this year when it scores 69 points or fewer and 18-5 when it scores at least 70.

PERFECT WHEN: The Thundering Herd are 7-0 when they turn the ball over nine times or fewer and 11-13 when they exceed nine turnovers. The Owls are 9-0 when they hold opponents to a field goal percentage of 41.1 percent or worse, and 4-18 when opponents exceed that percentage.

DID YOU KNOW: The Marshall offense has scored 80.4 points per game this season, ranking the Thundering Herd 30th nationally. The Rice defense has allowed 77.4 points per game to opponents (ranked 275th).