DETROIT (1/8/2020) -- The University of Detroit Mercy women's basketball team opens a stretch of four-straight games at home Thursday evening, hosting Horizon League foe Milwaukee for a 7 p.m. ET contest from Calihan Hall in Detroit. The game is set to be streamed live on ESPN-Plus.

The Titans are coming off a 1-1 weekend away from their friendly confines, earning a Horizon League win over UIC last weekend in Chicago on Thursday before falling to IUPUI on Saturday in Indianapolis. The red, white and blue close out a stretch of eight games out of 10 at home with their four-game homestand.

A Student Life tailgate precedes Thursday's game and is set to begin at 5:30 p.m. prior to the contest in the parking lot adjacent to Calihan Hall.

On The Court:

• The Titans have earned three Horizon League Freshman of the Week honors from three different players -- Sylare Starks (Nov. 25), Bridgid Fox (Dec. 16) and Markyia McCormick (Dec. 23). It's the first time in league history that three different players from the same team have earned the honor in the same season.
• Freshman guard Sylare Starks leads all Horizon League freshmen in scoring at 9.4 points per game; She also ranks 18th in the conference overall in scoring.
• Senior Zoey Oatis ranks second in the conference at 2.1 steals per game and has totaled 29 steals so far this season.
• Freshman guard Annika Corcoran is averaging 3.2 assists per game across her past five contests and ranks eighth in HL contests in assists per game (3.0).
• More than half of the scoring output this season by the Titans have come from the five true freshmen (53.4 percent // 445 total points). Titan freshmen have also combined for 50 of the 70 3-pointers made by the squad in 2019-20. Four of the top six scorers on the squad are freshmen.
• Freshman guard Markyia McCormick ranks second on the team in scoring (8.6 points per game) and third among Horizon League freshmen.
• It's the 58th meeting in women's basketball between the longtime league foes (Milwaukee leads series, 29-28).
• The Titans hold a 14-12 mark in home games all-time against the Panthers and are 3-5 against Milwaukee under head coach Bernard Scott.
• The Titans are one of the youngest teams in NCAA Division I with 10 underclassmen (five freshmen, five sophomores) and holds an average age of 19.3 on its roster.
• Head coach Bernard Scott is in his fifth season at the helm of the Titans and has led them to two top-four finishes and a Horizon League championship game in 2017.
• The Titans were picked to finish in ninth place in the 2019-20 Horizon League Preseason Poll.

Scouting Milwaukee:

• Milwaukee enters Thursday's contest having lost two-straight after dropping a road game at Green Bay last weekend and falling at home to Northern Kentucky during the opening weekend of the Horizon League slate.
• The Panthers did defeat the defending Horizon League champions, Wright State, by a 60-58 margin in their league opener on Dec. 28.
• Milwaukee is 4-10 overall this season and 1-2 in league play.
• The Panthers have balanced scoring this season with six players averaging better than 6.0 points, but nobody more than 8.2 currently. Brandi Bisping leads the team at 8.2 ppg, while Sydney Levy is just behind at 8.1 points per game.
• Lizzie Odegard leads the squad at 6.9 caroms per contest, while McKaela Schmelzer leads the squad with 2.6 assists per game.

Last Time Out
The Titans dropped an 82-45 road contest Saturday afternoon at IUPUI from Indianapolis. Sophomore guard Jiera Shears scored a season-high eight points and freshman forward Bridgid Fox also added eight points to lead Detroit Mercy in scoring. Freshman guard Sylare Starks had a team-high six boards, while freshman guard Annika Corcoran had a team-best four dimes.

Detroit Mercy shot 34-percent in the game, while the Jaguars sank 32-of-60 shots (53 percent). The Titans added seven steals -- two each by Zoey Oatis and Aly Reiff. Fox was 4-of-7 from the floor in the contest and Shears knocked down 3-of-7 field goal attempts, including a 3-pointer. Detroit Mercy made 9-of-12 free throw attempts in the game.

Freshmen Scoring
A bulk of the scoring output for the Titans this season have come from their freshmen class with the five true Detroit Mercy freshmen scoring 53-percent of the points in the 2019-20 season. Titan freshmen have accounted for 445 of the 832 points scored this season (53.4 percent). Sylare Starks leads the team and all Horizon League freshmen at 9.6 points per game, while classmate Markyia McCormick is second on the squad and third in the league in scoring at 8.6 points per game. Further, 50 of the 70 3-pointers made this season have been by the freshmen class -- Starks (19), Corcoran (13), McCormick (11), McDowell (6) and Fox (1).

Up Next
Detroit Mercy returns to the court Saturday, hosting Green Bay for a 1 p.m. ET contest from Calihan Hall. It's the second game of a four-game homestand in Detroit, with the Titans hosting Cleveland State and Youngstown State next weekend from Calihan Hall on Thursday and Saturday, respectively.