CONWAY, Ark. _ The top two scoring teams and individuals in the Southland Conference will go head to head Saturday afternoon when the University of Central Arkansas Bears host the first-place Nicholls Colonels at 3:30 p.m. at the Farris Center.

UCA's senior guard Jordan Howard leads the league _ and is third in the nation _ in scoring average at 25.4 points per game. Nicholls' Roddy Peters is second with a 19.1 average. His Colonels are No. 1 in the SLC in scoring, averaging 84.0 points per game, followed closely by Howard's Bears at 83.4.

The Colonels (17-9) who have won four consecutive games, and nine of their last 10, sit in sole possession of first place in the SLC with an 11-2 record, just in front of both Southeastern Louisiana (11-3) and Stephen F. Austin (10-3), and two games ahead of Sam Houston State (10-4) and New Orleans (10-4).

The Bears. following a tough home loss to McNeese State on Wednesday, are tied with Abilene Christian for seventh place in the standings, with five regular-season games remaininig. The top eight teams make the Southland Conference Tournament, set for March 7-11 at the Merrell Center in Katy, Texas.

UCA senior Mathieu Kamba is coming off his third double-double of the season, a 25-point, 12-rebound effort against the Cowboys. The  Bears' downfall was going 5 for 28 from three-point range after entering the game as the top three-point shooting team in the SLC.

Nicholls won the first meeting with UCA this season when the Bears wasted an 11-point first-half lead by shooting just 38.2 percent from the field in the second half at Stopher Gymnasium in Thibodaux, La. Peters led the Colonels with 21 points while Kamba scored 20 and Howard 15 for the Bears. The Colonels held Howard , the SLC's career three-point leader with 361, without a three-point basket for just the fourth time in his 115 career games at UCA.

Howard is the active career scoring leader and three-point leader in NCAA Division I with 2,304 career points and 361 three-pointers. He is second in the nation in total points (660) and third in scoring average (25.4) this season. Freshman 7-foot center Hayden Koval is also nationally ranked. He is fourth in blocked shots per game (3.24) and sixth in total blocks (81). Koval had UCA's second triple-double on Feb. 7 at Houston Baptist, with 17 points, 10 rebounds and a school-record 11 blocked shots. 

The Bears are first in the league in three-pointers per game (8.7) and the Colonels are second (8.2). The teams combined to make 35 three-pointers in one of their two matchups last season and 25 in the other.