Game Information
Opponent	Holy Cross Crusaders
Game Notes	Loyola
Date	Thursday, January 2, 2025
Time	6:00 p.m.
Location	Worcester, Mass. | Hart Center
Tickets	Purchase
Directions	Click Here
Online Media	ESPN+ | Live Stats

Quick Hits About The Hounds

• Loyola University Maryland men's basketball begins its 12th season in the Patriot League on Thursday, January 2, when it opens conference play with a 6 p.m. game at College of the Holy Cross.
• Loyola has five players averaging 7.0 points per game or more through the season's first 11 games, four at 8.2 or higher.
• Milos Ilic is one of only 17 players nationally (who qualify for the national rankings) and average 14 or more points and 8.7 or more rebounds per game this season. Ilic enters the first conference game with marks of 14.6 and 8.9.
• The Greyhounds enter League play with balanced in the minutes played column. Three players average between 27-28 per game and seven average 20 or more.
• Josh Loeffler is on the bench as the Greyhounds' head coach after taking the position as Loyola's 22nd all-time head coach in March 2024.
• He is joined on the bench by four assistant coaches: Matt Blue, Kevin Farrell, Ricky Hernandez and Khyle Diaz. 
• The Greyhounds are a new-look team in more ways than just its head coach for the 2024-25 season. Of the 6,475 total minutes played by Loyola players last year, only 53 percent of those returned to the roster this season.

Watch The Action

• The Loyola-Holy Cross game will stream live on ESPN+.

Series History Versus Holy Cross

• Loyola and Holy Cross will meet for the 28th time in series history when the teams take the floor on Thursday. The game will be the 21st regular-season Patriot League game between the teams.
• Holy Cross holds a 15-12 lead in the previous 27 games after sweeping the season series last year with an 86-78 win in Worcester on January 20, 2024, and a 70-67 victory in Baltimore on February 3.
• Loyola has won six of the last 10 games in the series dating back to January 18, 2019.

About The Crusaders

• Holy Cross finished the non-conference slate with an 8-5 record after closing December with three-straight wins over Quinnipiac, Siena and Regis (Mass.).
• Max Green leads the Crusaders with 13.8 points per game, while Joe Nugent (12.0) and Caleb Kenny (10.4) are also in double-figures.
• Jaiden Feroah is tops on the team with 6.7 rebounds per game, and Green is second at 5.1.
• The Crusaders scored and gave up an even number of points (905, 69.6 per game) during non-conference play.

Last Time Out

• Loyola held host DePaul to a season-low five 3-pointers and 20.8 percent from behind the arc, but the Blue Demons ended the Greyhounds' non-conference schedule with an 84-65 defeat in Chicago on December 28.
• Loyola used a 9-0 run midway through the first half to draw within a point, 13-12, on back-to-back layups by Milos Ilic, and baskets by Jordan Stiemke and Jacob Theodosiou made it 18-16 with 8:58 to play in the first half. DePaul (9-4) stretched its lead back to as many as 21 before halftime with a 26-7 run to go up 44-23.
• The Blue Demons' lead was 26 with 10:08 to go in the second before Theodosiou scored 10 in a row in less than three minutes for the Greyhounds. DePaul, however, kept pace with Loyola, and the lead expanded to 27, 80-53, at 5:54.
• Theodosiou finished one point off his career-high, tying for game-high honors with 22 points. He made 9 of 10 shots from the field in the game and 3 of 4 from behind the arc.
• DePaul was just 5 of 24 (.208) from 3-point range after entering the game ranked No. 14 in NCAA Division I by shooting 40.1 percent in its first 12 games. The Blue Demons, however, took advantage of a 47-31 advantage in rebounding, scoring 24 points off 16 offensive rebounds.
• Milos Ilic battled foul trouble but scored 13 and had six rebounds. Jordan Stiemke scored 10, while Veljko Ilic had six points and six rebounds and Goap Kodi scored six to go with three boards. 

Familiar Foes

• Josh Loeffler and Dave Paulsen will face each other as head coaches for the first time on Thursday night in Worcester, but they are not strangers.
• Loeffler was an assistant coach for Paulsen at Williams College in 2005-06.

About The Start

• With Josh Loeffler at the helm of the team, the 5-6 record to start the year is the best by a first-year Loyola head coach since Skip Prosser went 6-3 in his first nine games as the Greyhounds head coach during his only campaign on the Evergreen campus (1993-94).

Focal Point

• Milos Ilic has become the focal point of the Greyhounds' offense this year, and the 6-foot-10 post from Serbia has responded with his best start to a season in four years at Loyola. Ilic has led the Greyhounds with 14.6 points and 8.9 rebounds per game.
• Per Ken Pom, Ilic is taking 27.2 percent of Loyola's shots when he's on the court this season, up from 17.2 percent a year ago and 16.9 as a freshman in 2021-22. His Ken Pom usage rate is 28.9 percent this year.
• Ilic ranks 19th in NCAA Division I in points per game for players listed as 6-foot-10 or taller.

Pounding The Boards

• Milos Ilic is second in the Patriot League in rebounding through games of December 24 with 8.9 per game. His rebounding average is also 36th in NCAA Division I, and he ranks in the top 80 nationally in both offensive (45th, 3.18) and defensive (79th, 5.73) rebounds.

On The Defensive

• Loyola's perimeter defense has helped it lead the Patriot League – and rank No. 14 in Division I – through games of December 24 in 3-point field goal defense. Opponents are shooting just 27.5 percent from behind the arc against the Greyhounds this year.
• It's a significant turnaround for Loyola from a year ago when it ranked 310th out of 351 Division I teams as teams shot 35.8 percent from 3-point range against the Greyhounds.
• One of the notable non-conference defensive performances the Greyhounds had was at DePaul. The Blue Demons entered the game ranked 14th in the nation in 3-point percentage at better than 41 percent, but Loyola held them to 20.8 percent (5 of 24).

Bouncing Back Nicely

• Jordan Stiemke had his lowest scoring output of the 2024-25 season to start December when he saw just 14 minutes of action, went 1 of 5 from the field and scored two points at Coppin State.
• Stiemke responded by tying his to-date season-high in scoring with 15 points five days later at Delaware State before scoring a game-best 22 at Mount St. Mary's on December 14. He then scored 12 on December 21 against Hampton and had 10 at DePaul. Stiemke has made 11 3-pointers over four games while averaging 14.8 points.

Bench Scorer

• Jordan Stiemke has been the top scorer off the bench in the Patriot League this season, averaging 11.7 points per game through 11 Loyola contests to lead conference players who have started three or fewer games.
• Nationally, he is tied for 40th in points per game among NCAA Division I players who have five or fewer starts per stathead.com.
• The native of Bel Air, Maryland, was Loyola's second-leading scorer in the last 10 games of his freshman season (2023-24), averaging 10.3 points. Prior to that, he had scored just 34 points in 15 games.
• Spanning the last two seasons, Stiemke is averaging 11.1 points over the Greyhounds' last 21 games.

Back On The Court

• Veljko Ilic has been a big contributor for the Greyhounds in the last three games after missing the VCU, Boston College and VMI contests with an injury.
• He made 5 of 8 shots at Coppin State and scored 12 points in just 13 minutes of action. He then had a career-high 11 rebounds on December 7 at Delaware State, and he scored nine at Mount St. Mary's. He's averaged 7.4 points and 5.8 rebounds in 16.0 minutes per game during the last four.

Dimes, Swats & Boards

• Braeden Speed had seven assists and three blocked shots on November 26 against VMI to become one of just nine NCAA Division I players this year with those totals in a game (per Stathead.com as of Dec. 24 games).
• Speed came back with seven rebounds, five assists and seven points in the Greyhounds' next game at Coppin State.
• Over the Greyhounds' last six games, Speed has averaged 4.0 assists per game (24 total).

Contributions In Many Areas

• Jacob Theodosiou leads the team in minutes played (27.4) through 11 games as one of only three players on the roster averaging more than 26 minutes per contest.
• The sophomore transfer scored a career-high 23 points at Coppin State, making 4 of 8 3-pointers with three in the final 11 minutes of the comeback win. He had another 20-plus point game at DePaul when he made 9 of 10 shots to score 22.
• He is third on the team in scoring (11.6), first in steals (1.4) and fourth in rebounds (3.1).

Efficient With More Shots

• Milos Ilic has taken 10 or more shots from the field seven times this year and 11 times in his career. 
• In the 10 games he has taken 10 or more shots, Ilic is 70 of 132 (.530). He is 53 of 89 (.596) in the seven games this season.
• In only three of those overall games – a December 2023 contest at La Salle and this year's VCU and DePaul games – did Ilic not shoot 50 percent or better from the field; he was 12 of 35 shooting in those games.
• Ilic recorded his third career double-double on November 19 at Boston College, scoring 12 points while grabbing a career-best 14 rebounds. He had back-to-back double-doubles for the first time in his career with 28 points and 11 boards against VMI; the 28 points were the first time as a collegian he's scored 20 or more. He reached that point plateau again against Hampton, scoring 22.

Turnaround On The Line

• Loyola is second in the Patriot League and No. 132 in the nation as of December 11 with a 73.1 percent mark from the free-throw line. This year's percentage is almost  10 points better than the 64.4 percent the Greyhounds shot from the charity stripe in 2023-24 when they ranked 341st out of 351 NCAA Division I teams.

Sticky Fingers

• Tyson Commander grabbed seven steals against the Mountaineers on December 14, a career-high and the most by a Loyola player since Andrew Kostecka had seven in a win at Army West Point in February 2019.
• Commander's seven steals are tied for the third-most in school history and are tied for third-most by a player in NCAA Division I this season. He is the only Division I player this season with seven steals and five or fewer points in a game.

Twins Back Together

• Twins Milos and Veljko Ilic are rarely apart off the court, but they have been separated in playing time since the 2021-22 season.
• They played together in 26 games that year before a knee injury cut Milos Ilic's season short during the second half of Patriot League play.
• He would miss the entirety of the 2022-23 season while rehabilitating the leg, and Veljko Ilic missed the first 13 games of that year with an off-season injury. He came back to the lineup to play in 14 games during 2022-23 before injuring his knee and missing the remainder of the year and all of 2023-24.
• Milos Ilic was on the court last year, save for two games, but the November 4 season-opener was the first time they played in a regular-season game together in 993 days since February 16, 2022, the date of Milos' injury. They also saw time together against Lancaster Bible and NJIT, but Veljko missed the VCU, Boston College and VMI games with an injury. He returned to action against Coppin State.

Fast Start For Speed

• Braeden Speed has been one of the Patriot League's top freshmen through non-conference play, ranking fourth in points per game (8.2), second in assists (3.2), and third in minutes per game (27.1).
• Speed has shot 44.8 percent from the field and 81.5 percent from the free-throw line while ranking fourth on the team with an 8.2 points per game average. He has scored 10 or more in five of his 11 collegiate games.

At The Next Level

• As a school of less than 4,000 undergraduate students, Loyola University Maryland boasted three former student-athletes on NBA rosters as players and one as a head coach last month on opening night. Two members of the men's basketball incoming class of 2019, Santi Aldama (SAHN-tee ALL-dah-muh) and Cam Spencer are on the Memphis Grizzlies' roster, and four-time men's lacrosse All-American is a member of the Golden State Warriors.
• Michael Malone, a 1994 graduate of Loyola, was a four-year letterwinner as a point guard for the Greyhounds. He is now the head coach of the Denver Nuggets.
• Aldama was a first-round draft pick in the 2021 NBA Draft after leading the Patriot League in scoring and rebounding in 2020-21, and Cam Spencer led the conference in scoring the following season.
• Aldama has played in 200 NBA games through January 1 and is averaging 13.3 points and 7.4 rebounds through 30 outings this season.
• He starred for his native Spain this summer, earning TISSOT Most Outstanding Player honors at the Olympic Qualifying Tournament before averaging 17.7 points and 9.3 rebounds in three games during the Olympics.
• Cam Spencer, who was a three-year starter for the Greyhounds from 2019-22, and won an NCAA Championship at Connecticut in 2023-24, made his NBA debut on November 20 in a Grizzlies game against Philadelphia and later scored his first NBA basket on November 23... off an Aldama assist.
• Pat Spencer holds the Loyola men's lacrosse records for career assists and points and was the 2019 NCAA Division I Player of the Year for the Greyhounds. He switched to basketball after graduating from Loyola and has seen action in six career games with the Warriors.
• Malone had 282 assists in 108 career games with the Greyhounds from 1989-93. He is in his 12th season as an NBA head coach and guided the Nuggets to the 2023 NBA Championship.

Up Next

• The Greyhounds return to Reitz Arena on Sunday, January 5, to host Lehigh at 1 p.m.
• Loyola then heads on the road for a Wednesday, January 8, game at Army West Point.