University of North Carolina Ashville Athletics
Bulldogs Begin Journey to the Tourney on Friday Against Liberty
02.29.2016 | Men's Basketball
ASHEVILLE, N.C. – UNC Asheville knows its road to NCAA Tournament, a road that begins Friday afternoon at 2:00 p.m. against Liberty in Buies Creek, N.C. in the quarterfinals of the Big South Championship held at Campbell.
The Bulldogs, who finished the regular season 12-5 in league play and 19-10 overall, are the No. 4 seed in the tournament after finishing tied for third in the final league standings with Coastal Carolina. Asheville becomes the No. 4 seed and Coastal will be the No. 3 seed after the league tiebreaking procedures.
This marks the second consecutive season Asheville and Liberty have met in the Bulldogs' first game of the Big South Championship after an 80-70 Bulldog victory in the first round of last year's tournament. Asheville has won the team's last eight matchups and is 5-3 all-time against Liberty in Big South tournament meetings.
“Whoever you face in the tournament is going to be a good team. Certainly playing Liberty and winning Friday's game and advancing will be difficult. They are a good basketball team, they are well coached and have played well as of late,” Bulldog head coach Nick McDevitt stated.
“The second half of the season they have been one of the better teams in the league. We have to go into next Friday focused on Liberty and Liberty alone.”
Asheville, picked to finish seventh in the league's preseason poll, was among the top spots in the Big South standings all winter long, and finished the regular season with five players averaging double-figures in scoring, making them (along with Longwood) the first league members to have five players average at least 10.0 points since Charleston Southern in 2013-14 (Dylan Smith 13.5 ppg, Kevin Vannatta 11.8 ppg, Dwayne Sutton 11.7 ppg, Ahmad Thomas 10.8 ppg, Sam Hughes 10.6 ppg).
The Bulldogs put their stamp on the national statistics this season, finishing the regular season with the sixth-most total steals (276) and the seventh-best steals per game average (9.2 per) in the country. Asheville's three-point defense was also stingy all season and it finished ninth in the country overall after holding opponents to 29.7 percent shooting from long range. The Bulldogs' top-20 statistical ride finishes No. 19 nationally in turnovers forced per game (15.63), while the Dogs led the Big South in all four of the categories.
In the regular season, Asheville grabbed a 76-69 victory over Liberty in Lynchburg back on January 2 behind Thomas' career-best 27 points. Thomas added nine rebounds, seven steals and two assists before fouling out, while Sutton and Smith each had 16 points in the win.
Last Thursday, the Bulldogs completed the regular season sweep with a 73-56 win in a game that they never trailed in thanks in part to Hughes' game-high 17 points. The senior was 5-of-7 from the floor and added six rebounds, a steal and a block to his final stat line. Thomas had the game's only double-double (15 points, 10 rebounds) and Vannatta added 13 points.
High Point and Winthrop tied for the regular-season championship, with High Point getting the No. 1 seed and Winthrop the No. 2 seed due to tiebreaking procedures. Liberty tied with Gardner-Webb for fifth in the standings at 10-8, and the Flames secured the No. 5 seed and the matchup with Asheville thanks to winning the tiebreakers over Gardner-Webb.
For the first time in league history, a four-way tie for eighth-place occurred, as Campbell, Charleston Southern, Longwood and Presbyterian all finished 5-13. Through tiebreakers, Longwood took the No. 8 seed, Charleston Southern became the No. 9 seed, Presbyterian the No. 10 seed and tournament-host Campbell the No. 11 seed.
The Championship begins Thursday with three games (Longwood/Charleston Southern, Radford/Presbyterian, Gardner-Webb/Campbell) before a full slate of four games on Friday. Top-seeded High Point takes on the Longwood-Charleston Southern winner at noon prior to the Asheville-Liberty 2:00 p.m. matchup. The winners of those two Friday games will meet Saturday afternoon at 1:00 p.m. looking for a trip to the league title game, which will be at 2:30 p.m. Sunday afternoon.
The full bracket can be viewed here, while the tournament home page information regarding tickets, visitor information, parking and more can be viewed via this link.
