LEXINGTON, KY – Seven teams will compete over two weeks in November in the round-robin Roundball Showcase, announced Saturday by bd Global. Western Kentucky, Marshall and East Tennessee State lead the field as “host programs” for the event with Stephen F. Austin, Samford, UNC Wilmington and Campbellsville (Ky.) rounding out the field. All 13 games of the event will be played Nov. 16-30 as regulated by the NCAA’s rules on multi-team exempt events.
bd Global, LLC, a Lexington, Ky.-based sports marketing firm, is managing the event. The Roundball Showcase is one of six bdG college basketball events for the 2013-14 season which include the MGM Grand Showcase in Las Vegas, the Tip-Off Showcase in Dallas and the Lone Star Showcase in Houston.
“This region of the country boasts terrific basketball programs and to have WKU, Marshall and ETSU anchor this event makes this a very competitive Roundball Showcase,” said Brooks Downing, president of bd Global. “There are some great match-ups within this schedule of games between teams who will likely be NCAA Tournament-bound come March.”
WKU head coach Ray Harper adds six new players to a Hilltoppers’ roster than returns four starters from an NCAA Tournament team. Last season, Western Kentucky won the school’s second Sun Belt Conference Tournament title in as many years. Harper, one of the nation’ most distinguished head coaches with a 363-76 career coaching record, has won four national titles at the NCAA Division II and NAIA levels to go along with his two NCAA Tournament appearances at WKU.
Under the event format, WKU will have to play at Marshall, which will be led by Elijah Pittman, the Herd’s leading scorer last season at 16.1 points per game. The 6-9 senior led all Conference USA newcomers in scoring in 2012-13 after joining MU from Lamar State College-Port Arthur. Head coach Tom Herrion looks to return to post-season play after posting consecutive 20-win seasons in his first two seasons in Huntington.
Veteran head coach Murry Bartow has built East Tennessee State into one of the top mid-major programs in the country. His Buccaneers must play at WKU while playing host to Marshall to round out the event. In 10 seasons at ETSU, he had led the Bucs to 189 wins, four conference titles and three NCAA Tournament appearances. This season marks the school’s final year in the Atlantic Sun Conference before re-joining the Southern Conference in 2014.
Stephen F. Austin, led by first-year head coach Brad Underwood, finished last year with a 27-5 mark and won the Southland regular season conference title. Underwood was previously the top assistant under Frank Martin at both South Carolina and Kansas State. Samford’s Bennie Seltzer, a former top aide for Tom Crean at Indiana, is looking for similar success in his second year with the Bulldogs.
Buzz Peterson enters his fourth year in charge at UNC Wilmington and his 15th year overall as a head coach. The former UNC star alongside teammate Michael Jordan has four conference titles on his resume and led Tulsa to the 2001 NIT crown. Campbellsville University, an NAIA power from Campbellsville, KY, rounds out the field with games at UNCW and Samford.