Big South Conference
March 3-6. All games at Campbell.
kPOY: John Brown, High Point.

Big South action gets underway Thursday at Buies Creek, N.C, population 2,215.

The Big South has moved its tournament from the beaches of South Carolina to central North Carolina, thereby giving home court advantage to the 11-seed for this event. The top four teams in the league are remarkably equal, separated by a game in the conference standings and by 20 spots in the ratings.

UNC Asheville is the favorite here, and this doesn’t consider the status of High Point’s John Brown. The three-time kPOY winner missed the last three halves of basketball with a foot injury. Under third-year head coach Nick McDevitt, the Bulldogs start two freshmen and two sophomores (and somehow nobody over 6-5), so they figure to be challenging for a conference title in upcoming seasons. But they did some damage this season, going 12-6 in conference play. And in their six Big South losses they were outscored by a total of eight points in regulation. With a good showing here, they could be a sneaky-strong 16-seed.

                        Qtrs Semis Final Champ
 4 UNC Asheville         100  78.9  45.1  26.0
 1 High Point            100  80.9  44.5  25.3
 2 Winthrop              100  70.5  40.1  20.3
 3 Coastal Carolina      100  65.1  34.8  16.9
 7 Radford              78.0  26.7  11.0   3.9
11 Campbell             50.9  18.0   7.0   2.5
 6 Gardner Webb         49.1  16.9   6.5   2.2
 5 Liberty               100  21.1   5.9   1.6
 8 Longwood             53.3  10.7   2.7   0.7
 9 Charleston Southern  46.7   8.5   1.9   0.4
10 Presbyterian         22.0   2.9   0.5   0.07

Big South tourney records (since 1999)

Winthrop         32- 8
UNC Asheville    20-14
Longwood          3- 3
Coastal Carolina 13-15
Liberty          11-15
High Point       10-14
Gardner Webb      4- 6
Radford          10-15
Ch. Southern     10-16
Campbell          1- 4