The Western Kentucky Hilltoppers begin their 2021-22 regular season Tuesday against Alabama State. Diddle Arena will be full as both these teams have high expectations at the conference level to compete for the title.
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The game (8 p.m. ET start time) isn’t on TV, but anyone in the US can watch Alabama State vs Western Kentucky live on ESPN+:
ESPN+ will have exclusive coverage of 2,000+ college basketball games during the 2021-22 season. It also includes dozens of other live sports, every 30-for-30 documentary and additional original content (both video and written) all for $6.99 for a month or $69.99 for a year.
Or, if you also want Disney+ and Hulu, you can get all three for $13.99 per month. Separately, the three streaming services would cost a total $20.97 per month, so you’re saving about 33 percent:
Get the ESPN+, Disney+ and Hulu Bundle
Once signed up for ESPN+, you can watch Alabama State vs Western Kentucky live on the ESPN app on your Roku, Roku TV, Amazon Fire TV or Firestick, Apple TV, Chromecast, PlayStation 4 or 5, Xbox One or Series X/S, any device with Android TV (such as a Sony TV or Nvidia Shield), Samsung Smart TV, Oculus Go, iPhone, Android phone, iPad or Android tablet.
You can also watch on your computer via ESPN.com.
Alabama State vs Western Kentucky Preview
Alabama State will head into Diddle Arena knowing that they have never beaten Western Kentucky in their previous three tries.
More importantly, the Hornets start the season with back-to back games as after they play in Bowling Green, Kentucky, they will face off against Vanderbilt just a little less than 24 hours later.
Alabama State returns five players who saw significant playing time in 2021-22 including Second Team All-SWAC Preseason pick Kenny Strawbridge who returns as the team’s leading scorer.
This game also has a special significance for the visitors as they will be playing in their first non-conference game since the 2019-20 season. This was because last year, the Hornets decided to play only conference games in an effort to minimize travel due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Outside of the five players that are making their return, there are some interesting transfers that arrived to help win the program’s first SWAC title in a decade.
Trace Young (Wyoming) is projected to be a starter after sitting out the 2021 season. The Kentucky native comes in to strengthen the forward position where he was able to average 9.8 points as well as five rebounds. In addition to him, Gerald Liddell (Texas), Isaiah Range (Tarleton State), Michael Barber (Howard), and Ashton McClelland (Texas Southern) will all get some significant minutes while adding depth to the squad.
Western Kentucky are rebuilding as they will have to look for their overall production from other sources. With the departures of Charles Bassey, Tavern Hollingsworth and Jordan Rawls, the Hilltoppers will have only 30 percent of their offensive production returning this season.
The good news is that their backcourt will remain solid as trio of Josh Anderson, Luke Frampton and Dayvion McKnight remains intact and can offer them some important contributions.
Anderson was the third leading scorer on the team averaging 9.3 points.
All of this ends up leading up to the major question that everyone has coming into the season: How will they get their offense going?
Their offense is projected to be in the bottom half of Conference USA.
Coach Rick Stansbury hopes that some of the new faces end up filling the pending holes. Amongst the main focus, Keith Williams comes from Cincinnati where he started the last three seasons. Last season, he averaged 14.3 points, 4.1 rebounds and 2.5 assists.
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