GAME NOTES: Louisiana Tech seeks a third straight regular-season conference title, as the Bulldogs kick off their Conference USA schedule against the Southern Miss Golden Eagles on Saturday night.

Recent additions to Conference USA after residing in the Western Athletic Conference where they won the regular-season title before leaving two seasons ago, the Bulldogs have dominated the weaker, non-conference opponents on the schedule. In its most recent outing, the program crushed Southern Arkansas by a 74-52 score on Dec. 29, marking its second victory in the last three outings overall.

As for the Golden Eagles, who began the campaign without a single returning starter, they find themselves a game under .500 after losing three straight and four of the last five. Like the Bulldogs, USM was in action earlier this week, facing off against the LSU Tigers and falling hard, 87-67, on the road. Southern Miss is in the midst of a stretch where they are playing only one home game in a span of close to a month.

Southern Miss leads the all-time series by a 43-30 margin, although the Bulldogs won the most recent meeting during the C-USA Tournament semifinals last season, 88-70, in El Paso. Of the schools currently comprising C-USA, this is the most-played rivalry by far for the Bulldogs.

Against the Muleriders of Southern Arkansas, a program from the Division II ranks, Alex Hamilton scored the 1,000th point of his career as he led the Bulldogs with 17 points, followed by Xavian Stapleton with 16 off the bench in just 19 minutes. Raheem Appleby posted 12 points, Michale Kyser 10 and a team- high nine rebounds, while Kenneth Smith issued 11 of the team's 21 assists, yet failed to score a single point in the meeting as the hosts shot only 6- of-21 behind the 3-point line and turned the ball over 16 times.

Scoring in double figures in every game, Appleby leads the scoring list with 16.1 ppg for the Bulldogs, having accounted for 31 of the 95 3-pointers converted by the program. Hamilton checks in with 15.4 ppg and Erik McCree another 11.2 ppg as all three players have undoubtedly benefited from Smith and his 96 assists through 13 games.

USM led by as many as seven points in the first four minutes versus the Tigers in the latest outing, but that was before the visitors were outscored 10-1 at the free-throw line in the first 20 minutes and trailed by 16 at the break. Southern Miss was unable to make any headway in the second half of the 20- point setback, even as Chip Armelin tallied a game-high 28 points on 6-of-8 shooting behind the 3-point line. Matt Bingaya and Davon Hayes added 13 and 11 points, respectively, in the losing effort.

Despite the scoring burst by Armelin, he is still second on the unit with just 11.9 ppg, trailing Bingaya and his 15.4 ppg. Bingaya also leads the team with 5.9 rpg and 14 steals, but it is still difficult to look beyond the fact that he has converted only 29.5 percent of his 3-point attempts. Then again, Southern Miss doesn't really have a 3-point sniper that it can rely on from game to game as it averages less than seven conversions from long range per outing.

The real test now comes for a Louisiana Tech program that has been taking down easy targets to this point. As long as Appleby and Hamilton can get some support from teammates and Smith is able to be more than just a passer, the Bulldogs should be able to take down even this opponent as well.