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YOUNGSTOWN -- Jerry Slocum has reason to celebrate the new year.
For the first time in a long time, the Youngstown State men's basketball team and its coach isn't opening Horizon League play on the road.
Usually it's four of the first six or six of the first eight league games are away from Beeghly Center.
This year, it's not the case.
YSU (6-7, 0-0 Horizon League) opens league play tonight against Milwaukee (4-9, 0-0) at 7 p.m., in Youngstown.
The Penguins open the season at home with the league's two Wisconsin-based schools, Milwaukee (tonight) and Green Bay (6-6) on Saturday at 1 p.m. The Phoenix, the Horizon League Tournament champions, are at Cleveland State tonight.
Slocum's players arrived back in Youngstown on Monday and had a good practice Tuesday, which gave them a good day of rest on Wednesday in preparation for the season opener instead of preparing for a road game.
He said he gets nervous every Christmas night to see if his players can return to Youngstown without any weather delays. This year it was all clear.
According to Slocum, that led to two days of the best practice sessions of the year.
"All that said, you've got to take care of business and get it done," Slocum said. "We're off to a real positive start with it."
It'll be a chance for the Penguins to rebound from their last game where YSU shot a paltry 15 percent in the first half and was decimated by Ohio State on Dec. 20, 77-40.
Aside from the first-half OSU gaffe, YSU normally shoots 43.4 percent from the floor.
"What game was that?" Slocum joked. "Haven't talked about it. Haven't brought it up. We're a much better offensive basketball team. I thought we played really well our last three games. We didn't put the ball in the basket. It got out of hand.
"Thanks for bringing that up."
YSU, which scores 76 per game, gives up 81 points per contest and 46 percent from the floor.
One of the leading scorers in the Horizon League, junior shooting guard Cameron Morse, who averages 22 points a game, said playing defense is important for tonight's game. Milwaukee averages 64.5 per game and hasn't eclipsed 70 in its current four-game losing streak. The Panthers haven't won since a Dec. 5 victory at Montana State.
"We're a high-scoring offense, too," Morse said. "Our defensive motto is if we get stops, we get easy buckets and keep the score up high. I feel that should cancel everything out.
"I feel like we should win."
The Panthers are led by 6-foot-5 senior guard Cody Wichmann, who has 12 points per contest.
YSU's point guard Francisco Santiago averages 12.5 points, while small forward Matt Donlan puts in 11.7.
Slocum said he hopes the Penguins would get seven, eight wins in the non-conference portion.
He said the Penguins did answer some questions as far as who plays major roles on this year's team going into Horizon League play.
"I thought we got a lot of answers in terms of who can play where, or what kind of strengths some of our guys have," Slocum said. "As I said to our kids when they got back on the 26th, we're not a finished product. There's spots in our game that we have to get better at, that we have to keep on working at. Stay the course. Keep on working to get better. I think the non-conference play, we saw fast. We saw slow. We saw teams that pound it inside. We saw teams that are really good on the perimeter. I think we're ready.
"But nothing replaces working hard. You have to play hard in this league. I don't care if you're home or away, if you're bringing a C effort, you're going to get beat. Our margin of error is such that we have to play at a B to B-plus effort every single night to be successful."
ALL HEALTHY: Slocum said this is the first time since the Akron game that he's had everyone nearly injury free.
He couldn't say that this time last year when last year's senior center Bobby Hain suffered a season-ending injury at Notre Dame.
YSU has had a rash of injuries from Morse's right wrist sprain to Rahim Williams and others suffering random setbacks during the non-conference slate.
"Cam is 80-85 percent," Slocum said. "Rahim is back. He's 100 percent. This is the first time we've been healthy since Akron."
Morse said the wrist healed further when he went home to Flint, Mich., for a couple of days.
"I was icing it, just resting it," Morse said. "I feel like it's getting better."
LEAGUE LOOKAHEAD: Slocum sees Valparaiso and Oakland as the Horizon League favorites.
"Both of those teams are really good, but that have holes," Slocum said. "After that, I think it's a toss-up. I really do.
"It should be an exciting year, in terms of league play."
The Horizon League Tournament is at Joe Louis Arena in Detroit from March 3-6. Seeds seven through 10 play in the first-round to advance to play the top two seeds in the second round. Those winners move on to the semifinals.
Seeds three through six play in the third round. Those winners also move on to semifinals on March 5. The championship is on March 6.
"It's a little bit different this year that everybody's playing in that first round," Slocum said. "You're not necessarily fighting for byes, but you are fighting for a good seed."