Longwood earned the No. 5 seed in the upcoming Big South Championship tournament and will face No. 4 seed UNC Asheville in a quarterfinal matchup Monday, March 1, in Asheville, N.C.
The Lancers (11-15, 10-10 Big South) earned a bye through the first round of the four-round tournament and a trip to the quarterfinals for the second straight year. There, the Lancers will open tournament play against the Bulldogs (10-9, 9-5 Big South), with whom Longwood split the regular-season series in Farmville on Dec. 30-31.
A win over UNC Asheville would vault Longwood into the Big South semifinals for the first time since 2015, where they would face the winner of a quarterfinal matchup pitting No. 1 seed Winthrop and the winner of the first-round game between No. 8 seed High Point and No. 9 seed USC Upstate.
The Lancers enter the Big South postseason as one of the league’s hottest teams, winning eight of their past 10 games. Included in that end-of-season tear was a five-game winning streak and a six-game home-court winning streak that began in January and continued until a season-ending loss to Hampton Wednesday night.
The Lancers boast the Big South’s top defense, holding opponents to a conference-low 64.3 points per game in conference play, and have leveraged that success to multiple milestones this season. Among those are 10 Big South wins, which breaks last season’s record of nine, and a five-game win streak that is the program’s longest ever against Division I foes.
Longwood’s quarterfinal bout against UNC Asheville will air live on ESPN3, while a semifinal matchup would air on ESPN+ and the Big South Championship game on ESPN. All Longwood men’s basketball postseason games will also air live on WVHL 92.9 Kickin’ Country FM in Farmville and online at radio.securenetsystems.net/v5/WVHL.
More information about the 2021 Hercules Tires Men’s Basketball Championship is available at the Big South Championship homepage.
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