Third "Season" Begins Tonight for Men's Basketball
3/5/2010 7:02:00 PM | Men's Basketball
CHARLOTTE, N.C. - Games at the Bojangles Coliseum are underway, but at practice today, Eagles Head Coach Charlton "C.Y." Young went through final preparations with his team for tonight's Southern Conference Tournament game against third seed of the North Division, Chattanooga. Georgia Southern (9-22, 6-12), the sixth seed in the South Division, will take the court against the Mocs 30 minutes after the end of the 7 p.m. game between 4-South The Citadel and 5-North Samford. Voice of the Eagles Chris Blair will call all the action and John Koon will provide analysis. The game will be broadcast locally in Statesboro on WPMX 102.9 FM and globally on www.GeorgiaSouthernEagles.com.
The Eagles and Mocs have met four previous times in the Southern Conference tournament since Georgia Southern joined the league for the 1992-93 season. That first year in the SoCon, a standout point guard, Charlton Young, earned first-team All-Southern Conference honors and was named to the All-Tournament team. Chattanooga and Georgia Southern have the fourth-longest series in program history with the two schools meeting 43 times.The Mocs own a 25-18 advantage over the Eagles, including a 75-63 win in early January at Hanner Fieldhouse and a 4-0 mark in SoCon Tournament games.
"Tournament time is magical," said Young. "We have been preparing for this moment the entire season and I feel we are one of the teams playing its best basketball at the right time."
Georgia Southern has won three of its last five games with victories over Furman, at Samford and against Elon, before falling at UNC Greensboro Monday night in the final regular season game. The Eagles made an incredible attempt at a comeback, from 20 points down in the second half, but were two points short when the buzzer sounded, 79-81.
Junior guard Willie Powers III (Gainesville, Fla.) who leads the Eagles at 14.8 points per contest, was named to the All-Conference team by the SoCon coaches and placed on the third team by the members of the media this week. Senior guard Antonio Hanson (Ft. Worth, Texas), who averaged 29.5 points per game in the last two games of the season, was selected the SoCon Player of the Week for the week ending March 2. Hanson had a career-best 39 points with nine three-point baskets vs. Elon and finished the regular season with a team-leading 20 points at UNCG.
Sophomore guard Ben Drayton III (St. Marys, Ga.) takes the third guard spot in the starting lineup, scoring in double figures in four of the last five games. At the forward positions are junior Rory Spencer (Atlanta, Ga.) and sophomore Colby Wohlleb (Boca Raton, Fla.). Spencer recently broke Georgia Southern's single-season record for blocks (61 and counting) and Wohlleb (Raton, Fla.) has been shooting 58.8 percent from behind the three-point line over the last 10 games.
The Eagles last won a conference tournament game in 2005 when they defeated Western Carolina 69-57 in the quarterfinals. GSU won two straight in 2001, falling in the semifinals to the Mocs 84-73. This is the first time Georgia Southern will meet the defending conference champion in its first game in the championships.
