ITHACA, N.Y. -- The Cornell men's basketball team will face its first true test of the 2024-25 season and put its long non-conference home win streak on the line when it welcomes defending Southern Conference champion Samford to Newman Arena on Friday, Nov. 8 at 6 p.m. The contest will be broadcast on ESPN+.

• Prior to the contest, Cornell will unveil its 2024 NIT banner in the rafters, celebrating a 22-8 squad that finished tied for second in the Ivy League this past winter. 
• Cornell opened the season with a 93-52 win over Division III Marywood on Monday evening, shooting 52 percent from the floor and assisting on 30 baskets with three in double figures.
• The Big Red returns two starters and eight letter winners from last season, with former Big Red captain and longtime assistant and associate head coach Jon Jaques '10 taking over the program.
• Picked fourth in the Ivy League Preseason media poll, Cornell will be in search of its fourth consecutive appearance in the four-team conference tournament. 
• The Big Red will be attempting to bump its non-conference home streak to 19 games.
• Samford, under fifth-year head coach Bucky McMillan, went 29-6 a year ago and suffered a narrow 93-89 loss to Kansas in the first round of the 2024 NCAA Tournament.

GAME INFORMATION
Samford at Cornell
DATE & TIME: Friday, November 8 at 6:00 p.m.
SITE: Newman Arena – Ithaca, N.Y.
RECORDS: Samford (1-0, 0-0 SoCon), Cornell (1-0, 0-0 Ivy League)
SERIES RECORD: First Meeting
BROADCAST: ESPN+
STATS: CornellBigRed.com
DIGITAL PROGRAM: CornellBigRed.com
GAME NOTES: CornellBigRed.com

THE SERIES
1 Year • 1,011 Miles • 0 Meetings
Overall: First-ever meeting
In Ithaca, N.Y.: First-ever meeting
Current Streak: N/A
Last Meeting: N/A
Jaques vs. Samford: First-ever meeting

SERIES NOTES
This will be Cornell's first-ever matchup against Samford • the Big Red is 4-0 all-time against current members of the Southern Conference, going unbeaten against Mercer (1-0), VMI (2-0) and Wofford (1-0) • in addition to Samford, Cornell has also never played Chattanooga, The Citadel, East Tennessee State, Furman, UNC Greensboro and Western Carolina
.
A WIN OVER SAMFORD WOULD
• make Jon Jaques '10 a 2-0 record as a collegiate head coach.
• give Cornell a 2-0 start for the second year in a row and the third time in the past four seasons.
• make the Big Red 5-0 all-time against teams for the Southern Conference.
• make Cornell 56-30 overall (.651) since the beginning of the 2021-22 season.
• up the Big Red's non-conference record to 33-11 over its past 44 contests.
• bump its non-conference home win streak to 19 games.
• up its regular season non-conference win streak to 32 in non-guarantee games. 
• be the 1,333rd in program history (1,332-1,490-2 in 125th season, .473).

LAST TIME VS. SOCON OPPONENT
• For a long stretch during the Big Red's 86-80 victory over defending Southern Conference champion Wofford on Dec. 30, 2010, people watching the game must have felt the Cornell couldn't miss. 
• They were very nearly right. 
• At one point, Cornell made 18 straight shots, hit 15 3-pointers (on 71 percent shooting) and made 64 percent of its shots overall to snap an eight-game skid at the Richmond Marriott Holidays on the Hardwood Tournament.
• The Big Red made the final seven shots of the first half and the first 11 of the second, including eight from beyond the arc. 
• Its .714 from 3-point range is the second-best in school history.
• The team's 15 3-pointers is tied for the third-most in a game in Cornell history.
• Leading the way for the Big Red was the backcourt of juniors Chris Wroblewski and Drew Ferry, who combined to make 11-of-12 from beyond the arc. 
• Wroblewski scored 21 points and had a career-high 12 assists with just one turnover while adding five rebounds, making all four of his 3-pointers. 
• Ferry drilled a career-high 25 points, making his first seven 3-pointers .
 
LAST TIME OUT
•  Three double figure scorers and 53 percent shooting handed Jon Jaques '10 his first victory as a head coach in front of Newman Nation as the Cornell men's basketball team ran past Marywood 93-52 at Newman Arena. 
• None of Cornell's 19 players saw more than 18 minutes of action and everyone had a hand in its 18th consecutive non-conference home win. 
• Sophomore Jake Fiegen, making his first collegiate start, made 7-of-8 shots from the floor en route to 16 points and added three rebounds and two assists. 
• Junior Cooper Noard added 12 points and classmate Josh Baldwin, also making his first collegiate start in his return to Newman Arena after missing 2023-24 with an injury, had 10 to go along with three boards. 
• Senior Guy Ragland Jr. was dominant in his 13 minutes, scoring two points with five rebounds, four assists, two steals and a blocked shot.
• Cornell had 16 assists on 20 baskets, made 67 percent of its shots and held a 48-22 edge at the break.



TEAM NOTES TO KNOW
• Cornell earned two votes in the USA Today Coaches Poll on Jan. 29, 2023 after its victory over Princeton, the first time the Big Red earned recognition in the poll since ranking No. 17 in the final poll in 2010 (April 6, 2010).
• Since its return from COVID, Cornell men's basketball has posted a 55-30 record (.647), a mark that is 55-21 when removing regular season guarantee games (.724).
• Cornell is 32-5 at home over the past three seasons, including a perfect 16-0 against non-conference opponents over that span.
• The team's 22 wins last season were tied for second-most by a Big Red, matching the 2007-08 Ivy League champion squad and trailing the 29 wins from the 2009-10 squad.
• Seven of Cornell's eight losses came away from home against top 100 NET teams — nationally-ranked Baylor (No. 15 in NET, 24-11), Ohio State (No. 49 in NET, 22-14), Princeton (No. 55 in NET, 24-5), Yale twice (No. 83 in NET, 23-10),  Syracuse (No. 84 in NET, 20-12) and George Mason (No. 93 in NET, 20-12), six teams that each reached 20 wins and combined to go 133-64 (.675). 
• Over the past four seasons, the Big Red is averaging 17.8 assists per game and hitting 10.3 3-pointers per game while averaging 81.2 points per game. Over that stretch, Cornell is shooting .592 from two-point range.
• A year ago, the Big Red led Division I in bench scoring (36.0 ppg.) and ranked in the top 20 in effective field goal percentage (sixth, .572), assists per game (sixth, 18.1 apg.), 3-pointers (10th, 10.3), field goal percentage (14th, .487) and scoring offense (16th, 82.1).
• In 14 Ivy games last season, Cornell assisted on 241 baskets with 153 turnovers (1.58 assist-turnover ratio).  
• The Big Red was 18-2 last season when leading at halftime, with the two losses on the road at Ivy leaders Yale (46-38) and Princeton (35-33).
• Cornell has hit a 3-pointer in 973 consecutive games dating back to a contest against Denison in the 1988-89 season opener (0-for-2). Since the 3-point shot came into effect in NCAA play during the 1986-87 season, the Big Red has hit at least one shot behind the arc in 1,022 of 1,026 games (7,000 3-pointers over that span).

NOTES FROM THE MARYWOOD WIN
• Sophomore Jake Fiegen posted a career-high 16 points on 7-of-8 shooting, becoming the 10th different player on the roster to have a double figure scoring game in their career.
• The Big Red's 93 points were the most in a season opener since piling up 108 points at Barton Hall against Scranton in a 108-90 victory on Dec. 1, 1971.
• The 93 points were also the most by a Big Red coach in his debut on the Cornell sidelines since Lace's team closed out a 10-289 triumph at Colgate on Nov. 30, 1968.
• All 18 Big Red players that dressed played between five and 18 minutes.
• Fifteen players scored a point, 15 registered a rebound and 15 had at least one assist.
• After missing the 2023-24 season due to injury, Josh Baldwin scored 10 points and three rebounds, an assist and a steal in 12 minutes of action covering his first collegiate start.
• In addition to Baldwin, Fiegen was also making his first start.
• Junior Corbin Zentner, sophomore AJ Labeau and freshmen Ty Iwanonkiw, Anthony Nimani, Gioacchino Panzini, Mateen Rafiq and AJ Rodriguez all made their collegiate debuts in the win.
• Freshman Mateen Rafiq was among four Big Red players to lead the team in rebounding (five) and also dished three assists.
• The 30 assists rank as the fifth-most in a game in school history.
• Cornell shot 25-of-33 (76 percent) from inside the 3-point arc in the win.

MISCELLANEOUS TEAM NOTES
• Head coach Jon Jaques was a starter and senior captain on the 2009-10 Cornell team that advanced to the NCAA Sweet 16.
• Cornell has played in 47 different states, as well as in Cuba, Puerto Rico, Australia, France and Spain. The only states the Big Red has not played in are Alaska, North Dakota and Mississippi.
• The Big Red continues to be ranked among the best according to the annual NCAA Division I Academic Progress Report (APR). The APR measures semester-by-semester records for every individual team in Division I with regard to each team members' continuing eligibility, retention and progress toward graduation. The NCAA "commends" teams that have APR scores in the top 10 percent within their sport. Cornell has been recognized 10 times in since the APR began in 2005, including seven consecutive (2009-16).

THE BIG RED IN OVERTIME
• Dating back to the first overtime game against Penn way back in 1922, Cornell is 42-51 in games that go an extra period. 
• Cornell is 7-10 in multiple overtime games, with the longest game for the Big Red being a five overtime contest against Princeton, won by the Tigers 66-61 on Feb. 24, 1979 at Barton Hall. 
• Cornell is 31-19 in home overtime games, 2-2 in neutral contests and 10-29 in road games.

ARE CORNELL STUDENT-ATHLETES ON SCHOLARSHIP?
• The easy answer is no. Cornell student-athletes are awarded need-based financial aid, just as any other student who applies to the school - that package can come in the form of student loans and grants. 
• The basic intent of the original Ivy League agreement of 1954 was to improve and foster intercollegiate athletics while keeping the emphasis on such competition in harmony with the educational purpose of the institutions. 
• The Ivy League is nationally recognized for its level of success — absent of athletic scholarships — while rigorously maintaining its self-imposed high academic standards. 
• The Ivy League has demonstrated a rare willingness and ability, given the current national pressures on intercollegiate success, to abide by these rules and still compete successfully in Division I athletics.

UP NEXT
• The Big Red hits the road for the first time in the 2024-25 season when it visits La Salle on Tuesday, Nov. 12 at 7 p.m.
• The contest will be broadcast on ESPN+.
• Cornell holds a narrow 3-2 edge in the all-time series and has won two straight, including a 78-75 road victory over the Explorers on Dec. 29, 2009.
• The Big Red is 1-2 against the Explorers in Philadelphia, Pa.