2014-15 Yearbook

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CHICAGO - The UIC men's basketball team will play its lone exhibition game of the season on Thursday at 7 p.m. CT against Beloit College inside the UIC Pavilion. The contest will be shown live on ESPN3 with an audio broadcast available on UICFlames.com.

Head coach Howard Moore returns nine letterwinners from the 2013-14 campaign and adds six newcomers which include four junior college transfers. Headlining the talented crop of fresh faces is fifth-year graduate student Jay Harris (6-1, G, Wagner) who came to UIC from Wagner. Harris averaged 10.3 points per game for the Seahawks last year and shot nearly 40 percent from three-point range. Coming out of Oswego East High School in Aurora, Ill., Harris was the No. 22 rated point guard in the nation, according to ESPN.com/Scouts, Inc.

New JUCO additions also include juniors Jason McClellan (6-9, F, Eastern Wyoming College), D'Juan Miller (5-8, G, Eastern Arizona College) and Paris Burns (5-11, G, Vincennes). Coach Moore welcomes two freshmen to the program as well in Tai Odiase (6-9, F/C, Flossmoor, Ill.) and David Ramon (6-7, F, Madrid, Spain).

Senior Marc Brown stands as UIC's leading returner scorer with an 11.3 points-per-game average last season. Brown has made 76 starts during his three years with the Flames and owns 737 career points, needing just 263 more to become the 21st player in program history to reach 1,000.

During the summer UIC participated in its first ever foreign tour as the Flames traveled to Canada and played five games against University competition. The squad fell in its first two outings versus the No. 1 (Carleton) and No. 2 (Ottawa) ranked teams in the country after holding leads late in both games. The Flames rebounded and came home on a three-game winning streak, securing double-digit victories to finish the tour. Junior Gabe Snider led the Flames in scoring at 14.4 points per game, hitting 15-of-36 (.417) from downtown, which included a 28-point outburst against Ottawa.

New to the Flames' sidelines this season will be assistant coach Deon Thomas. Thomas was added to the staff in April after serving five seasons as the athletic director and head coach of Lewis and Clark Community College. Thomas earned the title of Illinois Mr. Basketball in 1989 from Simeon High School and went on to play at the University of Illinois where he still owns the career scoring and blocks records. Moore also promoted Jeremy Buttell to assistant coach after he served as the video operations director.

Beloit is coming off a 9-14 season last year as they return two starters and seven letterwinners. Head coach of the Buccaneers is Brian Vraney who begins his eighth season at the helm. Vraney and Moore were teammates at Wisconsin during the 1994-95 season when Moore was a senior and Vraney was a freshman.

Following Thursday night's contest, UIC opens regular season play at city-rival DePaul on Friday, Nov. 17. Tipoff is scheduled for 9 CT at McGrath-Phillips Arena.