University of Houston Athletics
Men's Basketball Team Opens Practice Saturday Morning
10/12/2001 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Oct. 12, 2001
The University of Houston men's basketball team begins official preseason practices Saturday, October 13, with two-a-day workouts. The Cougars will have two exhibition games against Nike Elite-Illinois and Texas Blue Chips before departing for the EASports Maui Invitational on November 19-21.
The Cougars begin their second season under head coach Ray McCallum with an exhibition game against Nike Elite on Thursday, November 1 at 7:30 p.m. on Guy V. Lewis Court at Hofheinz Pavilion.
Houston plays Texas Blue Chips on Sunday, November 11, at 2:00 p.m. before opening the regular season on Monday, November 19, against UCLA in the first round of the EA Sports Maui Invitational. The Houston-UCLA game will be televised live on ESPN2 at 10:30 p.m. (central).
McCallum welcomes back four starters off last year's squad. Junior George Williams heads the list of returnees after leading the Cougars in scoring with 13.5 points per game. He also averaged 7.3 rebounds.
Seniors Dominic Smith and Patrick Okafor along with junior Marcus Oliver also return to Houston's starting lineup. Smith averaged 12.6 points per game and set a UH single season record for the highest free throw percentage in school history with a .888 percentage (142-160). He also led Conference USA in steals with 65.
Okafor returns after finishing last season as one of the top three rebounding leaders in Conference USA with 8.3 rebounds per game. He also led the league in offensive rebounding with a 4.46 average and averaged 10.7 points per game for the Cougars.
Oliver made 24 starts for Houston and returns after avering 5.9 points and 3.2 rebounds per game.
McCallum also looks for immediate contributions from five new players, headed by two four-year transfers, Kevin Gaines and Louis Truscott. Gaines, a 6-4 guard, comes to Houston from Michigan and will join the Cougar roster in mid-December. Truscott returns to his hometown after playing two years at Nebraska.
In addition, Houston has added two junior college transfers in Jarret Sidney and Jeremee McGuire to his roster. Sidney also returns to his hometown after leading Northland Pioneer CC (Holbrook, Ariz.) in scoring and McGuire comes to Houston from Tyler Junior College (Tyler, Texas). In addition, the lone freshman on the Cougar roster is Bryan Shelton, a 6-4 guard from Clear Brook High School in Friendswood, Texas. Houston has one more player (Andre Owens) on its roster who is sitting out the 2001-02 campaign as a four-year transfer from Indiana.
