• Texas Southern closes out the regular season with another pivotal contest against Prairie View A&M Thursday night at 7 p.m. inside the H&PE Arena.
• With an expanded postseason tournament, the SWAC has adjusted its schedule as the final three weeks of the season will feature Thursday-Saturday-Tuesday match-ups for both men's and women's basketball teams. The tournament begins on Monday, March 9 for seeds 9-12 in Atlanta, Ga. TSU is currently in a four-way tie for second and needs to win in order to have a shot at the number two seed. The margin for error is slim as TSU could potentially drop to seventh with a loss and other factors. TSU could win but a Southern University win would move TSU to third but they hold tiebreakers over Alabama A&M and Florida A&M if they find themselves tied with either.
• TSU head coach Johnny Jones is 9-8 lifetime against Prairie View A&M and PVAMU's Byron Smith, a former assistant at TSU in 2009-10.
• Since 2012, TSU is 21-13 against PVAMU and has won seven of the past 10 games. In the H&PE Arena, TSU is 11-3 against PVAMU since 2012 as PVAMU has won two of the last five games in Houston since 2021.
• PVAMU head coach Byron Smith and current PVAMU assistant Keith Berard both served as assistant coaches at TSU. Smith spent the 2009-10 season at TSU while Berard spent five years (2002-07) at TSU.
• Texas Southern fell in the first round of the 2025 SWAC Tournament to Alabama State.
• TSU returns two starters from last season and 10 letterwinners as they lost five lettermen. The Tigers added seven newcomers to its roster in the offseason as five were added via the transfer portal. Senior guard Zaire Hayes was named to the 2025-26 Preseason All-SWAC basketball team after a career junior campaign which saw him finish second on the team with 10.3 points per game while finishing second on the team with 47 three-pointers made. He also shot 46 percent from the field and 84 percent from the free throw line.
• This marks the final homestand for seniors Zytarious Morlte, Bryce Roberts, Alex Anderson, Troy Hupstead, Duane Posey, Zaire Hayes and Jaylen Wysinger.
• TSU, which is led by eighth-year head coach Johnny Jones, enters the 2025-26 season looking to earn its eighth NCAA Tournament bid over the past 13 years. TSU finished fourth in the SWAC last season and picked to finish fifth this year.
• TSU made its fifth consecutive postseason under Jones in 2024 and participated in three straight NCAA Tournaments from 2021-23. Head coach Johnny Jones went 24-14 in his inaugural year as head coach with three Power 5 conference wins. TSU fell in the finals of the 2019 SWAC Tournament and advanced to the semifinals of the CIT in 2019. In 2019-20, the Tigers made it back to the semifinals of the SWAC Tournament after a third-place regular season finish but saw the season end abruptly due to COVID-19. TSU won the SWAC Tournament and First Four contest in 2021 and was the first SWAC team to beat a ranked opponent from the SEC in 2021 at Florida. TSU claimed another Power 5 non-conference win against Arizona State in 2022.
• Jones is 62-40 all-time in the month of March and 32-13 at TSU.
