GAME NOTES: A pair of teams hoping to explore uncharted territory get together on Wednesday night, as the Rice Owls and North Texas Mean Green begin play in the first round of the 20th annual Conference USA Tournament at Legacy Arena at the BJCC in Birmingham.

With this conference changing members recently, there is only one remaining school that can boast of being a previous tournament winner, that being Charlotte. Rice has won four of 13 decisions in this event over the years, while UNT is 1-1.

The ninth-seeded Owls finished the regular season eight games below .500 overall and were 8-10 in conference play, locking them in a four-way tie for seventh place in the standings with Texas-San Antonio, FIU, and the eighth- seeded Mean Green after the tiebreakers were applied.

Rice closed out the regular season last weekend with a narrow 68-65 setback at UTEP, the third defeat in the last four games for a program that has taken part in five overtime contests, posting wins in three of them.

As for the Mean Green, a team which was just 3-10 on the road, they closed out the regular season on a three-game slide, after winning five in a row, bowing to UTSA in the last attempt over the weekend, 69-68.

During the regular season, North Texas won both meetings with the Owls, capturing a 66-63 win on the road in early January and then repeating the feat at home three weeks later, 75-65.

The winner of this game will be rewarded with a matchup versus top-seeded Louisiana Tech in the quarterfinals on Thursday night.

As one of two Rice players to have started every game this season, it only makes sense that Seth Gearhart is also the top scorer for the program with his 15.4 ppg, boosting that number slightly to 15.7 ppg in conference play. He has converted not only 40.5 percent beyond the arc, but also 81.0 percent at the free-throw line where he has been almost twice as many times as any of his teammates. Gearhart, an All-Conference USA selection, was also second on the unit with 5.3 rpg, trailing only Andrew Drone (6.7 ppg) who cleared 5.4 rpg. The other double-digit producer for the squad is Marcus Jackson with 14.2 ppg, while Max Guercy (9.9 rpg, 4.6 apg) has also had his share of moments for the offense.

On a team that is scoring 65.7 ppg, the Mean Green have only a single player putting up double figures in Jordan Williams (14.9 ppg). Also tops on the team with 63 assists and 44 steals, Williams has managed to pull down 5.0 rpg, trailing only Jeremy Combs (9.8 ppg, 6.5 rpg) and Colin Voss (8.9 ppg, 5.9 rpg) but the big difference between him and the latter two performers is that he has knocked down 40 3-pointers in 143 attempts, while they have combined to miss their only attempt out on the perimeter. As a group, North Texas has had trouble with long-distance shots, converting only 30.6 percent of those chances heading into the postseason.

With more viable options at the offensive end of the floor, as well as heading into the postseason on a positive note, the Owls appear to have the advantage in this meeting.