Upcoming Event: Men's Basketball versus Mayville State (Exhibition) on October 29, 2025 at 8:30 p.m.
/
8:30 p.m.
Men's Basketball
vs Mayville State (Exhibition)
South Dakota State University Athletics
Friday, February 26
Brookings, S.D.
7:30 P.M.
South Dakota State University
vs
Kansas City
Photo by: Dave Eggen/Inertia
JACKS HOST ROOS IN REGULAR SEASON FINALE
2/25/2021 9:21:00 AM | Men's Basketball
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South Dakota State
    A top-two seed in next weekend's Summit League Tournament is at stake for South Dakota State, as the Jackrabbits (13-6, 7-3 Summit League) host Kansas City to wrap up the regular season.
    Game times will be 7:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday at Frost Arena in Brookings.
    SDSU has split each of the last three league weekends, going 1-1 against the other three teams at the top of the league standings (South Dakota, North Dakota State and Oral Roberts).
    The Jacks would finish no worse than second in the league with a pair of wins, but SDSU could drop to the No. 5 seed should Kansas City earn a sweep.
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Kansas City
    SDSU's matchup with the Kangaroos (11-10, 7-5 Summit League) is certainly a contrast in styles.
    The Roos play at a methodical pace that, combined with a physical defense, has limited teams to a mere 60.8 points per game. That ranks ninth in the country.
    It isn't just defense for Kansas City, however. Billy Donlon's team is ninth nationally in field goal percentage, shooting 50.5 percent.
    The Roos have used nine different starting lineups, but every combination has been competitive. Kansas City's five league losses have come by a total of 21 points.
    Outside of a 77-53 rout of North Dakota in Grand Forks on Jan. 3, every other conference game the Roos have played has been competitive into the waning minutes.         Â
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The Series
    South Dakota State and Kansas City have played 21 times, all since the Jackrabbits entered the Division I ranks in 2004-05. SDSU holds a 15-6 lead in the series.
    However, the Roos do hold something rare - a win in Brookings during the past decade. Kansas City won 65-38 on Jan. 27, 2011 at Frost Arena.
    SDSU has won nine of 10 against the Roos since that loss, the most recent a 75-47 drubbing of Kansas City on Nov. 28, 2018 in Brookings.
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3-Point Shooting
    The Jacks have been ringing the bell from long range this season.
    SDSU has made 40.1 percent of its 3-point attempts. State's efficiency from beyond the arc is the fourth best in Division I.
    Six times the Jackrabbits have made at least half of their 3-pointers in a game.
    Additionally, SDSU had made 10 or more triples on six occasions.
Double the Scheierman, Double the Fun
    Sophomore guard Baylor Scheierman has become a double-double machine.
    The Aurora, Neb., native has racked up 11 double-doubles, seventh most in the country.
    Scheierman currently ranks fifth in Division I with 8.63 defensive rebounds per game.
    How rare is what Scheierman is doing? He is only the fifth sophomore in State history to turn in 10 or more double-doubles in a season. One freshman has also turned the trick.
    Since SDSU moved to Division I in 2004, Scheierman is the sixth player with 10 or more career double-doubles.
    As a point of comparison, Mike Daum had a total of 11 double-doubles in his first two seasons. He went on to set a school record with 54 in his career.
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Wilson Excels
    Douglas Wilson isn't the reigning Summit League Player of the Year for nothing.
    The Des Moines, Iowa, product has eclipsed the 20-point mark once in each two-game conference series.
    In league-only action, Wilson is averaging 17.3 points per game, tops on the team and ninth in the conference.
    He's shooting 51.6 percent against the league and hauling in 5.3 rebounds per game while playing an average of just 27.9 minutes.
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Arians at the Stripe
    Junior guard Alex Arians has been incredibly efficient at the free throw line this a year.
    The Madison, Wis., native has made 54-of-61 at the stripe. That's 88.5 percent, which ranks in the top 30 nationally.
    Arians had a string of 28 consecutive makes earlier this season and was a perfect 18-for-18 to start league play.
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An Appel A Day...
    Luke Appel has been a model of efficiency in the low post for the Jackrabbit offense.
    Appel was limited to only 21 minutes in the first five games. He has logged at least nine minutes in 11 of the last 14, scoring in double figures in five of those tilts.
    In Summit League play, Appel is scoring 7.2 points in only 12.1 minutes per game.
    He's made 29-of-48 attempts, shooting 60 percent in conference play.
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Easley Does It
    Sophomore transfer Charlie Easley has risen to the occasion the last three weekends.
    He's started the three most recent games, and played 20-plus minutes in four of the last five.
    During this five-game stretch in which is name has been called regularly, he's scored 43 points - an average of 8.6 per game - and made at least one three in every game.
    He's shooting 14-of-29 overall and 10-of-18 from deep, including the game-winning triple with 16 seconds left at North Dakota State Friday.
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Dentlinger Picking Up Steam
    A year ago, Matt Dentlinger was an honorable mention all-conference player.
    He'd lacked consistency this year in the first 14 games - three times scoring double figures, twice going scoreless.
    The last five times out, he's reverted to his old form.
    Dentlinger tied his season high with 21 points against South Dakota (Feb. 6). In the two games at Oral Roberts last weekend, he scored 16 and 10.
    He followed that up with scoring efforts of 13 and 15 in the two-game series at North Dakota State, making 5-of-6 from the field in each.
    Over this five-game stretch, the Arcadia, Iowa native has done more than just tie shoes. He's averaged 15.0 points and 5.8 rebounds while making 31 of his 40 shots - that's 77.5 percent.
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Mims Shines in Fargo
    A veteran presence off the bench can be vital and Jackrabbit fans were reminded of that this past weekend in Fargo with the performance of guard Matt Mims.
    The pride of Cedar Rapids, Iowa, logged 50 minutes in the two games at North Dakota State.
    Mims scored nine points Friday and seven more Saturday, a total of 16, on 5-of-9 shooting. That included 4-of-7 from beyond the arc, highlighted by a 3-for-4 peformance from long range in Friday's win.
    Additionally, he dished out three assists and collected three steals on Saturday.
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Freidel's Season Ends Early
    All-Summit League guard Noah Freidel was on his way to another all-conference season when the Tea native announced his season was over on Feb. 17.
    Alongside head coach Eric Henderson, Freidel made the following statement:
    "After meeting with Coach Hendo and my family, we have decided that I am not going to play for the remainder of the year, as I have been struggling with depression and anxiety. I am going to take this time to get healthy and work through these mental health issues. I am so thankful for my amazing teammates and I cannot wait to get back on the floor with them soon."
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Summit League Favorites
    South Dakota State was the pick to win the Summit League in the conference preseason poll, garnering 33 of 36 first place votes. The Jackrabbits return the Summit's coach and player of the year and feature three preseason all-league honorees.
    Douglas Wilson was voted as player of the year, while Noah Freidel joined him on the first-team. Matt Dentlinger was chosen as second-team all-league.
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Power Five Wins
    SDSU's victory at Iowa State Dec. 2 marked the fifth time in the past six seasons the Jacks have defeated a Power Five program. Dating back to 2008-09, SDSU has beaten a Power Five opponent eight times in 13 seasons.
    Iowa State and Iowa have each fallen twice to the Jacks. In fact, SDSU is 4-0 against those two programs since moving to Division I.
    SDSU also has wins over Ole Miss, TCU, Minnesota and Washington in that span.
    That doesn't include a win at No. 16 New Mexico on Dec. 22, 2012 in Albuquerque.
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Run of Success
    South Dakota State has played in eight consecutive postseasons, a run that would likely have grown to nine if not for the COVID-19 pandemic causing all the tournaments to be canceled last March. That includes five NCAA Tournaments, a pair of National Invitation Tournaments and one trip to the College Basketball Invitational.
    Only 16 programs in Division I have played in each of the last eight postseasons.
    During this string of success, the Jacks have won five Summit League Tournaments and claimed at least a share of six regular season league titles.
    The Jackrabbits have won 20 or more games each of the last three years and seven of the previous nine seasons.
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Summit League Tournament Setup
    South Dakota State is playing for a top-two seed in next week's Summit League Tournament, scheduled for March 6-9 at the Sanford Pentagon in Sioux Falls. North Dakota State, currently No. 2 in the standings with a 10-4 record (.714) is at league-leader South Dakota (10-3; .769) this weekend for another pivotal series.
    If the Jacks sweep Kansas City and the NDSU-USD series ends with both teams going 1-1, SDSU would finish alone atop the league standings with a 9-3 record and a .750 winning percentage.
    Should the Coyotes sweep and finish 12-3 in the league, the best SDSU could finish is second.
    If NDSU wins twice in Vermillion, the Bison would be 12-4. It would take two Jackrabbit wins to tie the Bison in winning percentage at .750, but NDSU owns the tiebreaker in that scenario because they swept the Coyotes while the Jacks split with their in-state rival.
    One SDSU win this weekend ensures a top-three seed in the tournament.
    However, should Kansas City win twice this weekend, the Roos could jump all the way to the two-seed, while the Jacks could drop to the fifth spot.
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Frost Arena Effect
    No place in Division I men's basketball is harder for visiting teams to win in than Frost Arena. Don't believe us? Try this on for size...
    Since 2015-16, South Dakota State is 74-4 in Frost Arena. That's a .961 winning percentage at home over the past five seasons. Over that span, only Gonzaga and Kansas have won more than .920 percent of its home games,
    If that isn't enough, let's go back to 2011-12. SDSU has played 132 games at Frost in the last nine-plus years, winning 125 of them. Six of those seasons, the Jacks didn't lose at home.
    SDSU has four of the seven longest home court streaks in league history, including the conference record of 34 in a row from 2014 to 2017.
    Additionally, the Jackrabbits were one of 13 teams to go undefeated at home in 2019-20.
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Frost Effect Part 2: The Summit League
    Since joining the Summit League in the 2007-08 season, the Jackrabbits are 93-20 in conference games played at Frost Arena.         Â
    SDSU went 21-15 at home in its first four seasons in the Summit, but since then, the Jacks have been an impressive 72-5 against the league in Brookings. That's a span of nine seasons, including seven in which SDSU did not lost a game at home in league play.
| Games 20 & 21 | Kansas City (11-10, 7-5) at South Dakota State (13-6, 7-3) |
| When | Friday, Feb. 26 & Saturday, Feb. 27 | 7:30 p.m. |
| Where | Frost Arena | Brookings, S.D.. |
| Live Audio / Radio | Jackrabbits All-Access | Jackrabbit Sports Network I Al Bahe |
| Live Video | Jackrabbits All-Access ($)Â | Al Bahe MidcoSN2 & ESPN3 (Friday Only) | Tom Nieman & Jay Elsen |
| Live Stats | GoJacksLive.com |
| Game Notes | South Dakota State | Kansas City |
| Social Media | Twitter I Facebook |
South Dakota State
    A top-two seed in next weekend's Summit League Tournament is at stake for South Dakota State, as the Jackrabbits (13-6, 7-3 Summit League) host Kansas City to wrap up the regular season.
    Game times will be 7:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday at Frost Arena in Brookings.
    SDSU has split each of the last three league weekends, going 1-1 against the other three teams at the top of the league standings (South Dakota, North Dakota State and Oral Roberts).
    The Jacks would finish no worse than second in the league with a pair of wins, but SDSU could drop to the No. 5 seed should Kansas City earn a sweep.
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Kansas City
    SDSU's matchup with the Kangaroos (11-10, 7-5 Summit League) is certainly a contrast in styles.
    The Roos play at a methodical pace that, combined with a physical defense, has limited teams to a mere 60.8 points per game. That ranks ninth in the country.
    It isn't just defense for Kansas City, however. Billy Donlon's team is ninth nationally in field goal percentage, shooting 50.5 percent.
    The Roos have used nine different starting lineups, but every combination has been competitive. Kansas City's five league losses have come by a total of 21 points.
    Outside of a 77-53 rout of North Dakota in Grand Forks on Jan. 3, every other conference game the Roos have played has been competitive into the waning minutes.         Â
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The Series
    South Dakota State and Kansas City have played 21 times, all since the Jackrabbits entered the Division I ranks in 2004-05. SDSU holds a 15-6 lead in the series.
    However, the Roos do hold something rare - a win in Brookings during the past decade. Kansas City won 65-38 on Jan. 27, 2011 at Frost Arena.
    SDSU has won nine of 10 against the Roos since that loss, the most recent a 75-47 drubbing of Kansas City on Nov. 28, 2018 in Brookings.
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3-Point Shooting
    The Jacks have been ringing the bell from long range this season.
    SDSU has made 40.1 percent of its 3-point attempts. State's efficiency from beyond the arc is the fourth best in Division I.
    Six times the Jackrabbits have made at least half of their 3-pointers in a game.
    Additionally, SDSU had made 10 or more triples on six occasions.
Double the Scheierman, Double the Fun
    Sophomore guard Baylor Scheierman has become a double-double machine.
    The Aurora, Neb., native has racked up 11 double-doubles, seventh most in the country.
    Scheierman currently ranks fifth in Division I with 8.63 defensive rebounds per game.
    How rare is what Scheierman is doing? He is only the fifth sophomore in State history to turn in 10 or more double-doubles in a season. One freshman has also turned the trick.
    Since SDSU moved to Division I in 2004, Scheierman is the sixth player with 10 or more career double-doubles.
    As a point of comparison, Mike Daum had a total of 11 double-doubles in his first two seasons. He went on to set a school record with 54 in his career.
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Wilson Excels
    Douglas Wilson isn't the reigning Summit League Player of the Year for nothing.
    The Des Moines, Iowa, product has eclipsed the 20-point mark once in each two-game conference series.
    In league-only action, Wilson is averaging 17.3 points per game, tops on the team and ninth in the conference.
    He's shooting 51.6 percent against the league and hauling in 5.3 rebounds per game while playing an average of just 27.9 minutes.
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Arians at the Stripe
    Junior guard Alex Arians has been incredibly efficient at the free throw line this a year.
    The Madison, Wis., native has made 54-of-61 at the stripe. That's 88.5 percent, which ranks in the top 30 nationally.
    Arians had a string of 28 consecutive makes earlier this season and was a perfect 18-for-18 to start league play.
Â
An Appel A Day...
    Luke Appel has been a model of efficiency in the low post for the Jackrabbit offense.
    Appel was limited to only 21 minutes in the first five games. He has logged at least nine minutes in 11 of the last 14, scoring in double figures in five of those tilts.
    In Summit League play, Appel is scoring 7.2 points in only 12.1 minutes per game.
    He's made 29-of-48 attempts, shooting 60 percent in conference play.
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Easley Does It
    Sophomore transfer Charlie Easley has risen to the occasion the last three weekends.
    He's started the three most recent games, and played 20-plus minutes in four of the last five.
    During this five-game stretch in which is name has been called regularly, he's scored 43 points - an average of 8.6 per game - and made at least one three in every game.
    He's shooting 14-of-29 overall and 10-of-18 from deep, including the game-winning triple with 16 seconds left at North Dakota State Friday.
Â
Dentlinger Picking Up Steam
    A year ago, Matt Dentlinger was an honorable mention all-conference player.
    He'd lacked consistency this year in the first 14 games - three times scoring double figures, twice going scoreless.
    The last five times out, he's reverted to his old form.
    Dentlinger tied his season high with 21 points against South Dakota (Feb. 6). In the two games at Oral Roberts last weekend, he scored 16 and 10.
    He followed that up with scoring efforts of 13 and 15 in the two-game series at North Dakota State, making 5-of-6 from the field in each.
    Over this five-game stretch, the Arcadia, Iowa native has done more than just tie shoes. He's averaged 15.0 points and 5.8 rebounds while making 31 of his 40 shots - that's 77.5 percent.
Â
Mims Shines in Fargo
    A veteran presence off the bench can be vital and Jackrabbit fans were reminded of that this past weekend in Fargo with the performance of guard Matt Mims.
    The pride of Cedar Rapids, Iowa, logged 50 minutes in the two games at North Dakota State.
    Mims scored nine points Friday and seven more Saturday, a total of 16, on 5-of-9 shooting. That included 4-of-7 from beyond the arc, highlighted by a 3-for-4 peformance from long range in Friday's win.
    Additionally, he dished out three assists and collected three steals on Saturday.
Â
Freidel's Season Ends Early
    All-Summit League guard Noah Freidel was on his way to another all-conference season when the Tea native announced his season was over on Feb. 17.
    Alongside head coach Eric Henderson, Freidel made the following statement:
    "After meeting with Coach Hendo and my family, we have decided that I am not going to play for the remainder of the year, as I have been struggling with depression and anxiety. I am going to take this time to get healthy and work through these mental health issues. I am so thankful for my amazing teammates and I cannot wait to get back on the floor with them soon."
Â
Summit League Favorites
    South Dakota State was the pick to win the Summit League in the conference preseason poll, garnering 33 of 36 first place votes. The Jackrabbits return the Summit's coach and player of the year and feature three preseason all-league honorees.
    Douglas Wilson was voted as player of the year, while Noah Freidel joined him on the first-team. Matt Dentlinger was chosen as second-team all-league.
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Power Five Wins
    SDSU's victory at Iowa State Dec. 2 marked the fifth time in the past six seasons the Jacks have defeated a Power Five program. Dating back to 2008-09, SDSU has beaten a Power Five opponent eight times in 13 seasons.
    Iowa State and Iowa have each fallen twice to the Jacks. In fact, SDSU is 4-0 against those two programs since moving to Division I.
    SDSU also has wins over Ole Miss, TCU, Minnesota and Washington in that span.
    That doesn't include a win at No. 16 New Mexico on Dec. 22, 2012 in Albuquerque.
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Run of Success
    South Dakota State has played in eight consecutive postseasons, a run that would likely have grown to nine if not for the COVID-19 pandemic causing all the tournaments to be canceled last March. That includes five NCAA Tournaments, a pair of National Invitation Tournaments and one trip to the College Basketball Invitational.
    Only 16 programs in Division I have played in each of the last eight postseasons.
    During this string of success, the Jacks have won five Summit League Tournaments and claimed at least a share of six regular season league titles.
    The Jackrabbits have won 20 or more games each of the last three years and seven of the previous nine seasons.
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Summit League Tournament Setup
    South Dakota State is playing for a top-two seed in next week's Summit League Tournament, scheduled for March 6-9 at the Sanford Pentagon in Sioux Falls. North Dakota State, currently No. 2 in the standings with a 10-4 record (.714) is at league-leader South Dakota (10-3; .769) this weekend for another pivotal series.
    If the Jacks sweep Kansas City and the NDSU-USD series ends with both teams going 1-1, SDSU would finish alone atop the league standings with a 9-3 record and a .750 winning percentage.
    Should the Coyotes sweep and finish 12-3 in the league, the best SDSU could finish is second.
    If NDSU wins twice in Vermillion, the Bison would be 12-4. It would take two Jackrabbit wins to tie the Bison in winning percentage at .750, but NDSU owns the tiebreaker in that scenario because they swept the Coyotes while the Jacks split with their in-state rival.
    One SDSU win this weekend ensures a top-three seed in the tournament.
    However, should Kansas City win twice this weekend, the Roos could jump all the way to the two-seed, while the Jacks could drop to the fifth spot.
Â
Frost Arena Effect
    No place in Division I men's basketball is harder for visiting teams to win in than Frost Arena. Don't believe us? Try this on for size...
    Since 2015-16, South Dakota State is 74-4 in Frost Arena. That's a .961 winning percentage at home over the past five seasons. Over that span, only Gonzaga and Kansas have won more than .920 percent of its home games,
    If that isn't enough, let's go back to 2011-12. SDSU has played 132 games at Frost in the last nine-plus years, winning 125 of them. Six of those seasons, the Jacks didn't lose at home.
    SDSU has four of the seven longest home court streaks in league history, including the conference record of 34 in a row from 2014 to 2017.
    Additionally, the Jackrabbits were one of 13 teams to go undefeated at home in 2019-20.
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Frost Effect Part 2: The Summit League
    Since joining the Summit League in the 2007-08 season, the Jackrabbits are 93-20 in conference games played at Frost Arena.         Â
    SDSU went 21-15 at home in its first four seasons in the Summit, but since then, the Jacks have been an impressive 72-5 against the league in Brookings. That's a span of nine seasons, including seven in which SDSU did not lost a game at home in league play.
Players Mentioned
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