LA MIRADA, Calif. --- Biola Men's Basketball kicks-off a four-game homestand this week against a pair of repeat opponents from the Northern California pod. The Eagles beat Notre Dame de Namur and Dominican on the road and now have a chance to host the Argos and Penguins and hopefully find the way back into the win column.

THIS WEEK: vs Notre Dame de Namur (2-16. 1-11 PacWest) - Thursday Jan. 23 at 7:30 p.m.; vs Dominican (4-13, 4-7 PacWest) - Saturday Jan. 25 at 4:00 p.m.

MULTIMEDIA: Live video and live statistics will be available for all games. See the links below for the direct link for each game. Biola offers free live video of all home events at portal.stretchinternet.com/biola.

BIOLA (10-7, 6-5 PacWest) VS NOTRE DAME DE NAMUR (2-16, 1-11 PacWest): Thursday Jan. 23 at 7:30 p.m. \\ Live Stats \\ Live Video \\ Last Meeting: Biola wins 88-79
The Eagles look for their fifth straight win and second straight season sweep against the Argonauts, who enter the Jan. 23 clash at Chase Gymnasium in last place in the PacWest conference. The Argos and Eagles opened their 2019-20 PacWest schedules against each other back in November up in Belmont. Biola overcame some frigid shooting in the first half and a back-and-forth start to the second half to pull away late, winning 88-79. Alex Wright carried the Eagles in that one, posting 28 points, nine rebounds and four assists and helping spark the game-sealing 12-2 run. Marquise Mosley added 24 points in his Eagles' PacWest debut. The Argos split the next two contests of their homestand, but have been on a nine-game losing streak since then. NDNU is led in scoring by transfer newcomers Trevor Thompson, a redshirt sophomore guard from Arizona State, and Ajay Singh, a junior from DeAnza College. Thompson and Singh are averaging 14.2 and 14.0 points per game, respectively. It was another transfer, though, who stole the show in the Argos' first matchup against the Eagles this season, as SoCal native Cameron Fisher scored a game-high 32 points in the NDNU loss. Biola is the first stop on a quick two-game swing south for the Argos, as they finish up at Azusa Pacific on Jan. 25. There are some signs for a turnaround, as the Argos reached the 10 three-pointers and 30 rebounds mark for the fourth time this season in their most recent game, a loss to Dominican. Overall, NDNU is shooting a solid 40.9 percent from the field and 33.2 percent from three-point land. It will be up to the Eagles, especially the backcourt of Wright and Mosley, to help Biola beat that output once again on Thursday. Mosley and Wright look to follow up their combined 52 points the last time the Eagles and Argos squared off.

BIOLA (10-7, 6-5) VS DOMINICAN (4-13, 4-7 PacWest): Saturday Jan. 25 at 4:00 p.m. \\ Live Stats \\ Live Video \\ Last Meeting: Biola wins 65-64
The Eagles welcome the Penguins to Chase Gymnasium on Jan. 25 after also beating them on the road back in November. Dominican is currently tied with Fresno Pacific for eighth in the PacWest with a 4-7 conference record. A win against the Eagles would go a long way to help them climb up the standings. The Penguins came close to victory the first time they faced the Eagles this season, but Biola came out on top in a 65-64 thriller thanks to a Marquise Mosely game-winner with four seconds left. Four Eagles scored in double digits in that one--Mosley, Whitten Domiguez, Michael Bagatourian and Jesse Elrod, the latter of whom had a game-high 16 points. Elrod would up going 7-for-13 from the field and chipped in five rebounds in that one, helping keep the Eagles close before Mosley's clutch shot. That helped counter a 14-point, 15-rebound double-double from Penguins' big man Lazar Djurovic, which still holds up as one of the best performances of the season for the Serbia native. At 10.4 points-per-game, Djurovic is one of three double-digit scorers on Dominican's roster, joined by guard Jaelen Ragsdale (13.5 PPG) and Jordan Williams (14.5 PPG). It was Williams who was nearly the hero against the Eagles in that first game, as his three-pointer gave the Penguins a 64-63 lead with less than 40 seconds to go. Dominican is riding a two-game win streak thanks to victories against Academy of Art and NDNU, but will start their own two-game SoCal trip with a visit to conference leader Point Loma on Thursday. PLNU has yet to lose at home in conference play this season. The Penguins' recent hot stretch has been powered by some great shooting as they have shot 50 percent or better from the field in four straight games, including an impressive 6-for-11 from three-point range in their rivalry game against ART U. 

ABOUT LAST WEEK: The Eagles fought hard in tough environments against two of their biggest conference rivals but came up just short each time. After Concordia Irvine jumped up to a huge first half lead on Jan. 17, Biola's comeback bid fell just short in a 69-61 loss. It proved to be a case of too little, too late for the visiting Eagles as they held the home team just just 24.1% shooting from the field in the second half, ultimately outscoring the home team by eight. In a raucous, hostile Cornerstone Cup road game against Azusa Pacific on Jan. 19, the Eagles kept it close in the first half but faded down the stretch thanks to some white-hot shooting from deep for the home Cougars, who finished with 16 three-pointers on the night in an 87-66 APU win. The Eagles did get a nice bounce-back performance from Jesse Elrod in that one, as the big man scored a team-high 15 points on 6-for-14 shooting and went 3-for-8 from deep.

IN THE HUNT: Biola has itself positioned well to qualify for its first PacWest Conference Tournament in its first year eligible. The Eagles are currently fifth in the PacWest at 6-5 in conference. The Eagles are a half-game up on sixth-place Hawaii Pacific. Hawaii Hilo (5-6) and Dominican (4-7) are also within two games of Biola in the loss column. This gives special importance to Biola's rematch against the Penguins this week. As much separation as the Eagles can create between them and seventh and eighth-place teams in the conference will be important, with six teams making the tourney.

IT WILL GET EASIER: Biola's first half of the schedule has been more challenging than its second half. Through today the team's opponents have a combined .489 winning percentage. Over the course of the team's final 11 scheduled regular season games its opposition has just a .441 winning percentage. Biola has a 5-4 record against its repeat opponents in those final 11 games. 

HOLM-QUEST FOR 1,000: Head Coach Dr. Dave Holmquist enters his 40th season as the head coach at Biola this season. He's coached at BU since the 1978-79 season, but took a few years off here and there along the way. The legendary coach begins the year with 937 wins at Biola and 973 wins overall to sit on the doorstep to history. Holmquist's side would need quite the remarkable year to get him to 1,000 this season, but chances are he could grasp 1,000 total victories before the end of 2020. He would be just the fifth coach in four-year college men's basketball to reach the 1,000-win plateau. The most recent to cross the threshold was Jefferson University's Herb Magee. Magee, who's coached the NCAA Division II Rams (formerly Philadelphia University) since 1967, eclipsed the 1,000-win total on February 7, 2015. Others with 1,000 officially recognized coaching victories are Duke's Mike Krzyzewski, McKendree's Harry Statham (NCAA III) and Oregon Tech's Danny Miles (NAIA). Holmquist or Syracuse Head Coach Jim Boeheim should be the next to hit 1,000. Entering 2019-20, Boeheim has 946 officially recognized wins in his coaching career, which began back in 1976. He had 101 wins vacated by the NCAA, so when he reaches 1,000 he will technically be doing so for the second time. His Orange have averaged right at 20 wins-per-year over the last five seasons.

IT'S REAL STARTING NOW: The 2019-20 Biola Men's Basketball season has added significance in that it's the Eagles' first as full members in NCAA Division II. Back on July 12 the Biola campus received a call from the NCAA Division II Membership Committee notifying BU of its successful completion of the membership transition process. The change became official as of September 1 and now Biola is officially eligible for NCAA postseason play, national and regional rankings and official NCAA postseason honors for the first time. The Eagles are also now eligible to compete in the PacWest Conference tournament for the first time. The top-6 teams after the regular season qualify for the conference tournament. Biola finished in a tie for fifth last season and would have been into the postseason tournament had the Eagles been eligible. Azusa Pacific will host this year's tournament between March 5-7. This year Biola will also hope to finish top-8 in the NCAA Division II West Region and earn a spot in the NCAA West Regional and ultimately the national tournament. Last season, Point Loma made a postseason run all the way to the NCAA Division II title game, setting the precedent for a PacWest team to make a deep journey through the upper echelon of NCAA Division II. The Sea Lions lost in the title game to Northwest Missouri State. The PacWest had three teams (PLNU, Concordia Irvine, Chaminade) make the eight-team west regional.

UPCOMING MILESTONES:
Michael Bagatourian - 75 games played (73)
Michael Bagatourian - 500 field goals made (326)
Michael Bagatourian - 200 free throws made (133)
Michael Bagatourian - 400 rebounds (358)
Michael Bagatourian - 200 assists (147)
Michael Bagatourian - 100 steals (66)
Michael Bagatourian - 2,500 minutes (2,202)
Tyus Dennis - 50 games played (35)
Marquise Mosley - 120 games played (111)
Marquise Mosley - 2,000 minutes (1,892)
Marquise Mosley - 300 field goals made (210)
Marquise Mosley - 200 free throws made (144)
Marquise Mosley - 150 rebounds (127)
Marquise Mosley - 200 assists (210)
Marquise Mosley - 75 steals (61)
Chris Rossow - 2,500 minutes (2,376)
Chris Rossow - 300 field goals made (270)
Chris Rossow - 100 3-point field goals made (81)
Chris Rossow - 250 free throws made (208)
Chris Rossow - 300 rebounds (280)
Chris Rossow - 350 assists (309)
Chris Rossow - 150 steals (104)
Alex Wright - 1,500 minutes (1,482)
Alex Wright - 200 field goals made (144)
Alex Wright - 300 rebounds (248)
Alex Wright - 100 assists (94)
*Transfer student-athletes include numbers from other NCAA institutions

NEXT WEEK: vs. Point Loma (13-3; 9-1 PacWest) - Thursday, January 29, 2020 at 7:30 p.m.; vs. Azusa Pacific (14-3; 9-2 PacWest) - Saturday, February 1, 2020 at 7:30 p.m.