Men\u2019s Basketball Preview
\nBy Ben Anderson, FM88 Sports\u2019 Director
\nOct. 20, 2025
\nHUNTINGTON, W. Va. (WMUL-FM) \u2014 Tomorrow, the Thundering Herd faithful will get their first chance to watch the 2025-26 Marshall Men\u2019s Basketball Team as it plays host to the Alice Lloyd Eagles in a fans first exhibition at the Cam Henderson Center.<\/p>\n
The Thundering Herd is coming off a season where it finished 20-13, (12-6) in league play to finish fifth in the Sun Belt Conference. The Herd\u2019s season ended as it fell 77-74 against Arkansas State in the Sun Belt Conference Tournament Quarterfinals.<\/p>\n
The Herd is led by second-year head coach Cornelius \u201cCorny” Jackson, who concluded last season as a finalist for the 2024-25 Ben Jobe & Joe B. Hall awards. The Herd\u2019s success from a year ago earned him a contract extension through 2030.<\/p>\n
The Thundering Herd brings in eight newcomers to the roster this season. Jackson said that during the offseason, he focused on recruiting players that give the Herd the best chance to compete in the Sun Belt Conference.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe try to put a premium on winners,\u201d Jackson said. \u201cGuys that come from winning programs, we felt we did that, obviously with Andrew (Fuquay) and Caleb (Hollenbeck). They won 33 games last year in the Juco ranks. Shamarrie Hugie, he won 30 plus games at the Juco ranks. Matt Van Komen is 7’4. Bryce Slay, who had a very successful year.\u201d<\/p>\n
Jackson said what stands out about the offense this season is the ability to score from multiple spots on the floor.<\/p>\n
\u201cI do feel this team shoots the ball better,\u201d Jackson said. \u201cWe have Matt, (Van Komen), who\u2019s a huge lob threat, who\u2019s come a long way offensive since he\u2019s been here. So, he garners a lot of attention inside, and now he\u2019s able to kick out to Wyatt (Fricks), and Caleb (Hollenbeck) and Wilson (Dubinsky). And everyone on our team can shoot for three this year, which is exciting.\u201d<\/p>\n
Alice Lloyd enters the season as a first-year member of the NAIA Continental Athletic Conference after leaving the River States Conference. The Eagles are led by sixth-year head coach Scott Cornett who sits with an overall record of 78-37, after finishing last season 20-10.<\/p>\n
The Eagles a year ago made it to the NCCAA (National Christian College Athletic Association) Mideast Regional Tournament championship game but lost 89-73 to Ohio Christian. The Eagles became the second team since 1996 in the NCCAA to win at least 20 games in a season.<\/p>\n
With the game serving as an exhibition, it brings both teams a chance to evaluate its rosters and make final preparations for the upcoming regular season.<\/p>\n
The game will be broadcast on WMUL-FM 88.1 and on Stream 1 online at marshall.edu\/wmul. FM88 Sports\u2019 Ben Anderson and Rhys Owens will be on the call with pregame coverage at 6:30 pm and tip-off at 7 p.m.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Men\u2019s Basketball Preview By Ben Anderson, FM88 Sports\u2019 Director Oct. 20, 2025 HUNTINGTON, W. Va. (WMUL-FM) \u2014 Tomorrow, the Thundering Herd faithful will get their first chance to watch the 2025-26 Marshall Men\u2019s Basketball Team as it plays host to the Alice Lloyd Eagles in a fans first exhibition at the Cam Henderson Center. The<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1074,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[1490,1489,1488,1491,140,430,429,1492,219,115,535,582,575,100,375,69,300,28,138,1494,251,460,1493,236,462,23,212,301,1495,51,96,417],"class_list":["post-4272","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-wmul-sports","tag-alice-lloyd-basketball","tag-alice-lloyd-eagles","tag-alice-lloyd-university","tag-andrew-fuquay","tag-ben-anderson","tag-ben-anderson-marshall","tag-ben-anderson-wmul","tag-caleb-hollenbeck","tag-cam-henderson-center","tag-college-radio","tag-cornelius-jackson","tag-corny-jackson","tag-eagle-basketball","tag-fm88-sports","tag-herd-basketball","tag-huntington-wv","tag-marshall-basketball","tag-marshall-university","tag-marshall-university-athletics","tag-matt-van-komen","tag-sbc","tag-sbc-basketball","tag-shamarrie-hugie","tag-sun-belt-conference","tag-sun-belt-conference-basketball","tag-thundering-herd","tag-thundering-herd-athletics","tag-thundering-herd-basketball","tag-wilson-dubinksy","tag-wmul","tag-wv","tag-wyatt-fricks"],"acf":[],"fimg_url":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marshall.edu\/wmul\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4272","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marshall.edu\/wmul\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marshall.edu\/wmul\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marshall.edu\/wmul\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1074"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marshall.edu\/wmul\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4272"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.marshall.edu\/wmul\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4272\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4554,"href":"https:\/\/www.marshall.edu\/wmul\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4272\/revisions\/4554"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marshall.edu\/wmul\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4272"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marshall.edu\/wmul\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4272"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marshall.edu\/wmul\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4272"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}