Bucknell University Athletics
Bucknell Men's Basketball to Face Monmouth in NIT
3/13/2016 10:21:00 PM | Men's Basketball
NOTE: The Bison Club will be sponsoring a fan bus to the NIT game at Monmouth. To reserve a spot, please contact Todd Newcomb at 570-577-1771 or tnewcomb@bucknell.edu.
Bucknell will have a limited number of tickets for sale starting at noon on Monday via the ONLINE box office only (bucknell.edu/boxoffice).
LEWISBURG, Pa. – The Patriot League regular-season champion Bucknell men's basketball team will be headed to top-seeded Monmouth for the first round of the National Invitation Tournament (NIT). The contest will be played Wednesday at 7:30 p.m. at Monmouth's Multipurpose Activity Center in West Long Branch, New Jersey, and it will be streamed live on ESPN3.
The Bison bring a 17-13 record into their third NIT appearance. Bucknell captured the Patriot League regular-season title for the fifth time in the last six years with a 14-4 ledger, but it fell victim to Cinderella story Holy Cross in the PL Tournament quarterfinals. The ninth-seeded Crusaders upset the Bison 77-72 in double overtime, and then went on to capture the tourney title and take the league's automatic NCAA Tournament bid.
Like Bucknell, Monmouth also received an automatic bid to the NIT, although many pundits felt that the Hawks deserved an NCAA at-large spot. Monmouth boasts a 27-7 record, and its school-record victory total includes non-conference wins over No. 17 Notre Dame, UCLA, USC and Georgetown. The Hawks won the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference regular-season title with a 17-3 record, however they lost to second-seeded Iona 79-76 in the MAAC Tournament championship game.
The Hawks are led by MAAC Player of the Year Justin Robinson, who averages 19.5 points per game and has set a school record with 664 points so far this season. Micah Seaborn scores 13.1 points per game, Deon Jones averages 10.2 points and a team-high 6.3 rebounds per game.
Bucknell played three MAAC teams during the non-conference portion of the schedule. The Bison defeated Manhattan 80-67, lost to Siena 83-81 in overtime, and lost to Fairfield 101-91. Monmouth split its two meetings with Manhattan and swept both Siena and Fairfield. The Hawks did lose a non-league road game to Army West Point of the Patriot League, which Bucknell would later defeat twice.
Bucknell and Monmouth will be meeting for the very first time. The Bison are 47-52 all-time against the current members of the MAAC.
This will be Bucknell's third NIT appearance, all coming in the last five years. In 2012 the Bison knocked off No. 1 seed Arizona 65-54 in Tucson before falling 75-67 at Nevada in the second round. Last season, Bucknell dropped a 73-67 decision at top-seeded Temple in a back-and-forth game that had 11 lead changes.
The Bucknell-Monmouth winner will advance to take on either fourth-seeded George Washington or fifth-seeded Hofstra. Those two teams also play on Wednesday, with an 8 p.m. start on ESPN3.
