The Southern Jaguars and the TCU Horned Frogs meet in college basketball action from Ed & Rae Schollmeier Arena on Monday night.

Southern Team Preview

The Southern Jaguars come into this one looking to build on a decent 2022-23 season, finishing 15-17 overall including an 11-7 mark in SWAC conference play. The Jaguars would be bounced in the quarterfinals of the SWAC tournament by Alabama A&M. It looks to be a tough spot for the Jaguars to be in coming into this season, losing their two double-digit scorers from last year in Brion Whitley (11.8 PPG) and Bryson Etienne (10.7 PPG, 3.8 RPG) as well as P.J. Byrd (9.2 PPG, 5.5 APG), Tyrone Lyons (8.9 PPG, 3.9 RPG) and Terrell Williams (7.2 PPG, 4.2 RPG). The other conundrum the Jaguars are dealt is that their leading returner in terms of minutes per game last year is Brandon Davis, who averaged just 16.8 MPG last season and no returning player for the Jaguars averaged more than 5.7 PPG and 4 RPG last year. There’s still help coming in from the transfer portal, but it’s likely going to be a struggle early on for Southern.

TCU Team Preview

The TCU Horned Frogs will be looking to build on a solid 2022-23 campaign where they finished 22-13 overall, including 9-9 in Big 12 conference play. TCU took out Kansas State in the quarterfinals of the Big Ten tournament before falling to Texas in the semifinals. The Horned Frogs got an at-large bid to the NCAA tournament, defeating Arizona State in the first round before narrowly falling to Gonzaga in the second round. TCU loses the services of scoring guard Mike Miles Jr. (17.9 PPG, 2.7 APG) and Damian Baugh (12.6 PPG, 5.8 APG, 4.7 RPG) but replaces them with a pair of solid guards in Jameer Nelson Jr. (20.6 PPG, 4.6 RPG, 3.6 APG, 2.4 SPG) from Delaware and Avery Anderson III (11.1 PPG, 3.4 APG) from Oklahoma State. Trevian Tennyson (15.7 PPG) also transfers in from Texas A&M-CC to help with backcourt depth and double-double machine Essam Mostafa (12.4 PPG, 10 RPG) transfers in from Coastal Carolina to aide Emanuel Miller (12.3 PPG, 6.5 RPG) with added depth in TCU’s front court. The pieces are there for TCU to make a run back to the NCAA tournament, it’s just about execution for the Horned Frogs.

Chris’ Pick

I’m backing TCU here. I just feel like Southern’s lost too much from last year’s squad and hasn’t done enough coming into this season to really address those issues. The Horned Frogs lost quite a bit as well, but they brought in a ton of talent and while there is concerns about maybe a slow start, I don’t think that TCU struggles enough to let Southern hang around. Give me the Horned Frogs here.