North Texas senior guard Yari Escalera pulled her teammates aside before the Mean Green’s game against Arkansas State in the first round of the Sun Belt Conference tournament on Wednesday to give them a bit of advice.

“I told them it was tournament time and not save anything,” Escalera said. “We had nothing to lose.”

And, of course, UNT had a whole lot to gain with a win.

Thanks to a big night from Escalera and freshman guard Mansa El, UNT did win and advanced to tonight’s quarterfinals. UNT, the No. 11 seed, will face No. 3 Denver at 9 p.m. in Hot Springs, Ark., where the remainder of the tournament will take place.

The Mean Green will head into that game with momentum on its side.

“We concentrated and played together,” El said. “We played more as a team. You could see it. We had a lot of fun, which is something we can build on for the Denver game. We are dangerous if we play together. The looks on our faces said it all. We hadn’t played like that all year.”

Escalera and El led UNT to the win by scoring 18 and 17 points, respectively. The pair helped carry the Mean Green, which was without first-team All-Sun Belt Conference selection Amber Jackson.

The senior forward leads the Mean Green with an average of 16.8 points and 9.5 rebounds a game, but has not played since being suspended before UNT’s final regular season game against Denver.

UNT head coach Shanice Stephens said that Jackson won’t play against Denver, but that she has not made a final determination about her status for the rest of the season. Jackson is not with the team in Arkansas.

The Mean Green relied on its backcourt to make up for the production it lost when Jackson couldn’t play, and will likely need a big game from its guards again against Denver.

“We need our guards to shoot the ball well again,” Stephens said. “We need them to attack the basket because it opens up the outside shot. That is what we did in our last game. It really is clicking now.”

UNT could rely on its backcourt again against a Denver team that is not one of the bigger teams in the Sun Belt.

Britteni Rice, a 5-7 guard, is averaging 11.4 points a game and is the only Denver player scoring in double figures.

UNT guards Brittney James and Tricia Lee are averaging 10.5 and 10.2 points a game for the Mean Green, which started four perimeter players against ASU and will likely use a similar approach again tonight.

“We may be smaller than Denver, but other than that we match up pretty well,” El said. “We have an aggressive three-guard backcourt. If we can get some stops and take away their game, we should be OK.”

The confidence UNT built in its win over ASU could be the Mean Green’s biggest asset of all. Few expected UNT to get out of the first round.

“The girls are confident,” Stephens said. “When you have that big victory, sometimes you have that letdown in your next game. We are trying to avoid that and build on what we did in our last game.”

BRETT VITO can be reached at 940-566-6870. His e-mail address is bvito@dentonrc.com .