COMMERCE– The Texas A&M University-Commerce men's basketball team will take on Dallas Christian College on Saturday night. The game begins at 7 p.m. at the Field House.
 
WHO: A&M-Commerce vs. Dallas Christian
WHEN: Saturday, November 19 at 7 p.m.
WHERE: The Field House in Commerce, Texas
LIVE STATS: http://statb.us/b/147038
LIVE VIDEO: https://portal.stretchinternet.com/tamucommerce/
 
The Lions are coming off of a strong first week of the season. They won both of their games, averaging a margin of victory of 12.5 points. After reviewing the film, head coach Sam Walker liked what he saw from his team in their first games against another team.
 
"It has been a good week of growth," he said. "A lot of good things came from those two games. Anytime we play at home– I don't care if it's the first game of the year or the last– we expect to win. Us being able to do the things that we practice and doing them at a high level against another opponent, we were very pleased."
 
Walker was happy with his team's offense, which is averaging 92.5 points a game. He also liked his team's effort on the defensive end, but wants to lower his team's points allowed. Teams are averaging 80 points per game so far this season.
 
"We have some guys who can really score the basketball," he said. "We need to utilize them. But we need to get that 80 down quite a bit. If we can really protect the ball and execute, I think this is a team that can score a lot of points in a lot of different ways."
 
Although he was critical of his team's defense, one of his players received praise from the conference. Dorian Armstrong was named the Defensive Player of the Week.
 
"It's funny because I was reaming our guys about defense and how we didn't guard well enough. Then we find out one of our guys was named Defensive Player of the Week," Walker said with a laugh. "The guys had a lot of fun with that. 'Coach, we've got the Defensive Player of the Week, somebody had to be doing something right.'"
 
Walker praised Armstrong for his effort on both ends of the floor over the past week.

"He has been a catalyst on both ends of the floor," Walker said. "Offensively with his shot selection and his patience, that makes us a lot better. And he has been an anchor for our defense. We look to have that throughout the year and have some guys who follow his lead as far as being consistent on both ends of the floor."
 
The Lions look forward to their game against Dallas Baptist. Walker said a game against a Division III opponent allows his team to work on things that will help them improve against Division II opponents, such as special situation plays. It also helps him give his bench players some experience.
 
"It is a great opportunity for us to get guys into the game who practice really hard but don't get to play very much," he said. "It gives us a great chance to grow a little bit. We look forward to doing that. At the end of the day, of course we want to win. But we want to be better when the game is over than we were when it started."