Southern Illinois Salukis (2-7) at Valparaiso Beacons (3-7)

Valparaiso, Indiana; Sunday, 2 p.m. EST

BOTTOM LINE: Valparaiso hosts Southern Illinois after Leah Earnest scored 24 points in Valparaiso's 79-71 loss to the Detroit Mercy Titans.

The Beacons are 2-2 on their home court. Valparaiso allows 68.6 points to opponents and has been outscored by 2.7 points per game.

The Salukis are 1-4 in road games. Southern Illinois has a 1-7 record in games decided by 10 points or more.

Valparaiso is shooting 43.3% from the field this season, 0.2 percentage points higher than the 43.1% Southern Illinois allows to opponents. Southern Illinois' 35.4% shooting percentage from the field this season is 8.7 percentage points lower than Valparaiso has given up to its opponents (44.1%).

The matchup Sunday is the first meeting of the season for the two teams in conference play.

TOP PERFORMERS: Earnest is shooting 50.4% and averaging 18.0 points for the Beacons.

Gift Uchenna is averaging 15 points, 11.7 rebounds and 2.3 blocks for the Salukis.

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The Associated Press created this story using technology provided by Data Skrive and data from Sportradar.