Tuesday, March 17th, 9:00 p.m. (et).

FACTS & STATS: Site: Arena Auditorium (15,000) -- Laramie, Wyoming. Television: HDNet. Home Record: Northeastern 7-5, Wyoming 12-3. Away Record: Northeastern 10-6, Wyoming 3-9. Neutral Record: Northeastern 1-1, Wyoming 4-1. Conference Record: Northeastern 12-6, Wyoming 7-9. Series Record: First-ever meeting.

GAME NOTES: The South Regional of the second annual College Basketball Invitational pits the Wyoming Cowboys against the visiting Huskies of Northeastern. The Cowboys, who are in the postseason for the first time in six years, are trying to win their 20th game of the 2008-09 campaign, which would make them just the 19th team in school history to turn the trick. Wyoming was a hot team coming out of the gate this season with nine wins in 10 tries, but the quality of those early opponents did little to enhance the squad's stature. The team closed out the regular season with back-to-back setbacks versus BYU and New Mexico at home, but then bounced the Lobos from the Mountain West Conference Tournament with a 75-67 decision last week. A day later, the Pokes were on the outside looking in following a 68-55 loss to Utah at the Thomas & Mack Center. As for the Huskies, they were forced to play a huge portion of their games away from home this season and that certainly didn't help matters for the Colonial Athletic Association member. After losing the regular season finale to Old Dominion in overtime and dropping the squad to third in the league standings, Northeastern proceeded to make an early exit from the CAA Tournament with a 58-54 loss, which means the squad has been waiting 10 days to get back to action against a team that it is meeting for the very first time. The winner of this contest will face the survivor of the UTEP/Nevada contest in the quarterfinals on Monday, March 23rd.

The Huskies have been far from an offensive force this season, averaging just 62.4 ppg, but at least the squad can take pride in the fact that it also did the job at the defensive end of the floor by limiting opponents to only 59.8 ppg. In fact, when it came to conference games Northeastern permitted a mere 56.3 ppg which is why the group finished so high in the standings. From an overall standpoint, Matt Janning sits atop the scoring list for the Huskies with his 14.1 ppg, shooting just under 40 percent from the floor in his 30 starts. Janning, who was tied for the team-high with 47 three-point baskets, was second with 4.7 rpg, 79 assists and 43 steals as well. Manny Adako contributed 11.3 ppg to the attack as a 56.6 percent shooter from the field. However, Adako had some issues getting his teammates involved, credited with just 19 assists and 52 turnovers in his 27 starts.

The first player in Mountain West Conference history to earn all-conference honors in each of his four years, Wyoming's Brandon Ewing made the First Team after a 2008-09 campaign in which he was one of the most dynamic scorers in the conference. Focusing solely on MWC bouts, Ewing led the conference in both scoring and assists with 18.6 ppg and better than five dishes per contest as well. Overall, Ewing was credited with 18.4 ppg and 164 assists over the course of 32 games. Sean Ogirri and Tyson Johnson, two players who made the cut for all-conference honorable mention, contributed another 14.8 and 13.3 ppg, respectively, while Afam Muojeke turned his 13.7 ppg and 5.3 rpg into a campaign for MWC Freshman of the Year. One of the better scoring teams in the MWC this season with 75.3 ppg, the Cowboys too often gave those points right back to the competition by allowing 74.6 ppg along the way.

A road-weary team to begin with, the Huskies cannot be happy about having to travel to Laramie for this meeting. It also doesn't help Northeastern that the Cowboys were rather hard on non-conference visitors to Arena Auditorium.

Predicted Outcome

Wyoming 67, Northeastern 64