Mercer eyeing "Road Warrior" label in CBI battle at North Texas
By Michael A. Lough
The Sports Report
centralgasports@gmail.com
The winning streak stopped abruptly in the first round of the Southern Conference Tournament, but Mercer’s men started another one and look to extend it in postseason play.
The Bears are in the Dallas, Texas area for Monday night’s CBI battle with North Texas.
The teams will at play at 8 p.m. in The Super Pit, a 10,500-seat arena hosting its first postseason game since 1980.
The Bears and Mean Green are in the quarterfinals, along with a former A-Sun rival of Mercer, Campbell, which beat Miami, Ohio 97-87.
Another former conference rival is alive. Jacksonville State won 80-78 at Canisius.
San Francisco hosts Utah Valley, is at New Orleans is at Campbell, and Central Arkansas welcomes Jacksonville State.
The tournament will be re-bracketed after this round. The semifinals are Wednesday, and the best-of-three championship round starts on March 26.
North Texas is in the postseason for the first time since an NCAA trip in 2010.
An oddity of the first round is that half of the road teams won, including Mercer and North Texas.
The Mean Green didn’t have quite the road trip Mercer did, but handled South Dakota 90-77 for the Coyotes second home loss of the year.
North Texas is 16-17, with losses to Nebraska (86-67), Georgia Tech (63-49), Oklahoma (82-72), and Georgetown (75-63) in non-conference play, and lost 74-72 to NCAA Tournament team Marshall.
The Mean Green have players from Nigeria, Russia, and the Virgin Islands, and six from Texas.
Mercer will have to play quality perimeter defense against a team that made 14 3-pointers in the first-round win.
Guard Roosevelt Smart’s 34 points in that win rank fourth in CBI history, and freshman post Zachary Simmons had 17 rebounds, second-most in CBI history. Guard Ryan Woolridge is 23 assists from tying the school record.
North Texas doubled its win total from a year ago en route to its fourth postseason invite in program history and first win. The Mean Green was only 5-10 on the road until beating South Dakota.
Mercer is 19-14, winner of nine of its last 10 and going for the fourth 20-win season under head coach Bob Hoffman.
If the Bears win Monday, Wednesday and then take the tournament championship, Hoffman will hit the 600-win mark for his career.
The Bears may be primed for a run, thanks to the return last week of Ria’n Holland after 13 games, out with a hand injury. He had 10 points in 20 minutes off the bench in the win at Grand Canyon, after averaging 19 points a game before the injury.
The Bears feature three career 1,000-point scorers in Stephon Jelks, Jordan Strawberry, and Demetre Rivers.
Jelks is also third on the program list with 838 rebounds and is only the third Mercer men’s player to score 1,000 points and grab 800 rebounds.
Strawberry and Ross Cummings each had 21 points in the win at Grand Canyon, which was sparked late by an 11-0 run.