Houston head coach Tom Penders said his team might not be at 100 percent in terms of health, but it is better than the squad that flew into Arizona last season and was demolished in an 87-62 blowout.
He and his team will look to bounce back from their Jan. 2 loss at the hands of Massachusetts with a payback win over 10-4 Arizona in its 2 p.m. game Saturday at Hofheinz Pavilion.
In order to succeed, the 11-2 Cougars will have to find a way to slow down forward Chase Budinger, a tough task for the team, Penders said.
"I don’t think there’s anything anybody can do to take him out of the game, and there’s a reason for it," Penders said. "They run a lot of great stuff for him. He’s a great outside shooter, and he’s pretty good off the bounce. He knows how to finish. He’s a complete offensive player."
UH senior forward Dion Dowell, who Penders and his coaching staff said has improved immensely on defense, will likely see some time against Arizona’s go-to guy if it doesn’t get him into foul trouble.
Dowell scored 12 points and had six rebounds in his first game as a Cougar against Arizona last season. He’s become one of Houston’s better offensive weapons and looks to up his performance against one of the best teams in the Pac-10 Conference.
"I don’t know if it’s developed into a rivalry, but they’re a powerhouse team with a well established name," Dowell said. "We just want to come out Saturday and play our game. Every game’s a rivalry any time we play any team. I take the same approach whether we’re playing Rice, Morehead State or Kentucky."
Junior center Marcus Cousin finally has the boot off and will be ready to play in the game after spending a month out with a high ankle sprain, but Penders said not to expect too much from the 6-11 big man.
"Marcus is going to take a while," Penders said. "He’s going to be able to play, hopefully, Saturday, but he’s been out for a month and a half. It’s hard to expect him to come out of the cocoon and be able to do what he’s capable of doing. Maybe he can give us 10 minutes. That’s probably the max he can hope for."
Senior guard Lanny Smith went into last season’s game hobbling on one foot but still made an impact running the point.
Houston associate head coach Melvin Haralson said Smith is only about 75 percent back to the All-Conference USA selection form he was in prior to his foot injury in 2006, but Smith at 75 percent is better than no Smith at all.
"I think Lanny coming back to play this year, as opposed to last year, he’s going to be playing with a lot more mature guys, like when he played (the Wildcats) two years ago and beat them," Haralson said.
Smith said he remembers the 2005 season when the Cougars upset then No. 7 Arizona in front of a packed house at Hofheinz, and he definitely remembers their huge victory over Kentucky last December, in which there was a record-setting number in attendance.
He said a big crowd against Arizona would be the best thing to for his team.
"That means so much, having the fans in the stands," Smith said. "Every year I’ve been here, whenever we’ve been able to get that kind of crowd we either win or we’re right there in the game. Having the crowd here really helps, and it gives us a home-court advantage. When we go on our runs and the fans get loud, the other reams get rattled."
