November 14, 2000
The Texas A&M men's basketball team ends its exhibition season against Kraitene Marijampole, a touring team from Marijampole, Lithuania, on Wednesday at 7:30 p.m. at Reed Arena.
Fans who bring a canned food item will be admitted for just $2. Collected items will be donated to the Brazos Food Bank and the Twin Cities Mission for Thanksgiving distribution. Regular ticket prices are $15 courtside, $12 mezzanine, $10 balcony and $6 gallery.
The Aggies defeated Team Ezybonds, 79-77, on Nov. 7 in their first exhibition game. A&M opens the regular season against George Washington on Saturday in Washington, D.C., then return to College Station for the homer opener against North Texas on Monday at 7 p.m. at Reed Arena.
The Aggies played the first exhibition game without the services of several injured players, and Wednesday's game will be similar. Senior forward Aaron Jack has been out since suffering a concussion on Oct. 18, although he has returned to practice on a non-contact basis, while sophomore forward Tomas Ress still is recovering from a staph infection that left him hospitalized for more than a week. Sophomore center Andy Slocum also likely will miss the game with tendonitis in his right shoulder.
Sophomore point guard Jamaal Gilchrist did not play against Team Ezybonds, but is expected to return to the lineup against Kraitene Marijampole.
Kraitene Marijampole is 1-8 on its American tour and is coming off a narrow 63-57 loss to Lamar on Monday in Beaumont. The Lithuanians' lone victory came against Grand Canyon by a score of 85-83 on Nov. 7. The other losses have been to Air Force (100-97), Colorado (99-75), Colorado State (95-62), Arizona State (85-63), Northern Arizona (103-62), Southern Utah (95-63) and Nicholls State (67-64).
Kraitene Marijampole is led by Ben Baum, who scored 18 against Lamar on Monday, and Kenneth Kenry, who scored 14 against the Cardinals.
"The difficult part of playing exhibition games against these foreign teams is that you never really know who will show up to play for them as far as personnel," Third-year A&M coach Melvin Watkins said. "But we tend to focus more on what we're doing and our personnel, anyway. We want to continue to work out the bugs and improve on both ends of the court and, in our case, get some people healthy."
Against Team Ezybonds, sophomore forward Keith Bean led the Aggies with 20 points, eight rebounds, three blocks and four steals, while sophomore guard Bernard King added 19 points and senior forward Carlton Brown scored 14.
The Aggies made 44.3 percent from the field, but was out-rebounded, 37-30, and allowed Team Ezybonds to connect on 50.0 percent of its field goal attempts.
"Offensively, we saw some good things, especially from Keith and Bernard," Watkins said. "We executed pretty well in the half court and I was pleased with that. Defensively, we had some shortcomings, some of it because we were missing some personnel. We had some players at positions they were not used to playing. Overall, I was pleased with our effort. Last year, we would have lost that game and this year, we won it."