The beauty of college basketball lies in its season of second chances: the conference tournaments in March. Regardless of how grim the situation appears for the Travis Diener-less men's basketball team, the season is not yet over.

The Golden Eagles will be playing for seeding in the Conference USA tournament when they host overachieving Houston Wednesday. Tom Penders, the frontrunner for Conference USA coach of the year in his first season at Houston, may return to the NCAA tournament earlier than expected if the Cougars continue their unlikely surge.

After starting 3-4 in C-USA, Houston has won six of its last seven games. Wins at Marquette and at home against Alabama-Birmingham Saturday would give the Cougars a 20-win regular season and an 11-5 record in the conference.

Even if Houston's ambitions fall short in the coming weeks, the Cougars have nonetheless doubled their win total from last season (nine) and tripled their conference wins.

A three-pronged attack in the backcourt has fueled much of Houston's scoring. Andre Owens, Lanny Smith and Brian Latham have accounted for 58 percent of the team's offense. Smith, who leads the Cougars in assists (4.2 per game), has averaged 16.5 points per game during their current four-game winning streak.

Marquette's underachieving season can be attributed to both self-inflicted wounds (second-half collapses against Texas Christian Feb. 9 and Louisville Feb. 17) and real ones to senior guard Travis Diener.

The final minutes of the Cincinnati game, however, showed resilience from the Golden Eagles and proved that junior forward Steve Novak's perimeter shooting can keep Marquette close in games against superior opponents.

This article appeared in The Marquette Tribune on Mar. 1 2005.