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The tournament field for the 2018 General Shale Southern Conference Tournament in Asheville, N.C. is now set. UNC Greensboro (24-7, 15-3 SoCon) claimed the No. 1 overall seed with an 88-75 win over Samford on Sunday afternoon. The win over the Bulldogs coupled with ETSU’s 79-76 loss to Furman means the Spartans also claimed the regular-season Southern Conference title outright.
The Spartans will face the winner of the Friday night’s opening game between No. 8 seed The Citadel (10-20, 5-13 SoCon) and No. 9 seed VMI (9-20, 4-14 SoCon). The Keydets swept Duggar Baucom’s Bulldogs during the regular-season.
Remember, Baucom is the former head coach at VMI, and was the Keydets’ head coach in their return to the Southern Conference Tournament in 2014-15 before moving on to The Citadel following the season.
ETSU (23-8, 14-4 SoCon) will be the No. 2 seed and will face the winner of the 7 seed Samford (10-21, 6-12 SoCon) and 10 seed Chattanooga (9-22, 3-15).
With its win Sunday, Furman (22-9, 13-5 SoCon) claimed the No. 3 seed and will face No. 6 Western Carolina (13-18, 8-10 SoCon) in Saturday night’s nightcap, with tip time slated for approximately 8:30 p.m. Furman claimed a 78-55 win over Western Carolina and claimed the season sweep of the Catamounts.
Mercer (18-13, 11-7 SoCon), which finished the season with eight-straight wins, claimed the No. 4 seed, with a thrilling 69-68, win at Wofford (20-11, 11-7) Sunday. The Bears head to Asheville as the hottest team in the SoCon.
The Terriers had a chance to claim the No. 3 seed, however, the one-point setback at home coupled with Furman’s win at ETSU sent the Terriers to the No. 5 seed. These same two teams will face each other next Saturday in the second quarterfinal clash, with tip-off time set for approximately 2:30 p.m. With Mercer’s win Sunday, the two teams split the regular-season series.
Stay tuned next week for a full preview of the 2018 Southern Conference Tournament.
Bracket:
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