By: Anthony Evangelista
After a hard-fought college basketball regular season, March is finally here.
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The nine members of the Big South Conference will make the trek to Johnson City, Tenn. this week and scrap for a bid to the NCAA Tournament. After Longwood shocked the conference in 2024 and pulled off three major upsets enroute to their second March Madness appearance in three years, teams are aware that the bracket is a fresh start from the regular season and anything can happen.
Anthony Evangelista Previews The Big South Tournament
This year, High Point comes into the tournament as the glaring favorite, winning 14 of its 16 Big South games and holding the top seed for the second-straight season. Each team will need three victories to be crowned the champion, except Gardner-Webb and USC Upstate, who have an extra play-in game on their schedule due to their spot at the bottom of the standings. UNC Asheville and Winthrop round out the top three, both finishing the year with 11 conference wins and posing a legitimate threat to High Point’s nation-leading win streak. Winthrop had an extremely strong end to the season and it wouldn’t be surprising to see the Eagles continue their dominance in Johnson City.
Radford, Presbyterian, Longwood and Charleston Southern sit in the middle seeds, and their regular season play should be an indicator that they have a shot against any team. After a slow start, Presbyterian won five of their last seven matchups, including three impressive road victories against Longwood, Radford and UNC Asheville. Presbyterian comes into the tournament as a first-round underdog against Radford, but they’re getting hot at the right time. Longwood is in a similar spot to last year and has the talent to go on another shocking run, finishing the season strong after a five-game losing streak to start February. The Lancers will have a tough task dealing with the Radford Highlanders and their consistent efficiency in the first round, though.
The Big South Tournament kicked off last night with Gardner-Webb knocking off USC Upstate in the play-in game, and wrap up with the championship Sunday at 2
p.m.
