Junior Richie Gordon has scored in double figures in five of his last seven games.

 
Western Carolina Visits Former SoCon-Member Marshall in Opening Round of CollegeInsider.com Tournament

Catamounts and Thundering Herd renew old conference rivalry for first-time since 2002

March 16, 2010

Huntington, W.Va. - Former Southern Conference rivals Western Carolina and Marshall will square off Tuesday night in the opening round of the CollegeInsider.com Post-season Tournament at the Cam Henderson Center. Tip-off is set for just after 7:00 pm from the on-campus arena.

Tuesday's game will be broadcast by the Catamount Sports Network with radio air signals only (no online broadcast), as per tournament directives and contractual obligations. Fans can follow the broadcast locally on Power 90dot5, WWCU-FM; 680 AM WRGC in Sylva; and 920 AM WPTL in Canton. Air time is 6:30 pm for the Carolina Ford Dealers Pre-game Show.

Fans can follow the CollegeInsider.com Post-season Tournament with online streaming audio and video on Fox College Sports Network. (Subscription required) Video feed along with audio broadcast will be available on a pay-per-view online basis at www.FoxCollegeSports.com.

The Catamounts (22-11) are making their first post-season tournament appearance since winning the 1996 Southern Conference Tournament championship in Greensboro, N.C., and making the NCAA Tournament. WCU, which has dropped two-straight in the series, trails overall, 13-29, with the last series meeting coming during the 2002-03 season. Marshall (23-9) has won three-straight in the head-to-head series in Huntington and leads at home 18-4.

Western Carolina handed Marshall it's first-ever loss in its home arena, the Cam Henderson Center during the 1981-82 season. The Herd has won 76-percent of its home games in the building since '81 and is 14-3 at home this season.

Concurrent ties to the Southern Conference - both WCU and Marshall joined the SoCon in 1976 and 39 of the meetings occurred while the two were in the same league - are far from where the familiarity ends. Catamount assistant coach Wade O'Connor spent two seasons on the Thundering Herd bench under former Marshall head coach Billy Donovan from 1994-96.

Also, Marshall red-shirt sophomore Camden Miller began his collegiate career at WCU before transferring after his rookie season. Miller averaged nearly three points per game as a reserve for the Catamounts as a freshman.

The Catamounts have won three of their last four games, including ending a three-game slide in the SoCon tournament and advancing to the conference semifinals for the first-time since 1999. Seniors Brandon Giles and Jake Robinson - both of which were named to the NABC All-District second team on Monday - continue to pace the team with an 11.8 and 11.4 point per game averages, respectively.

But it has been the improved play of red-shirt sophomore Harouna Mutombo and junior post Richie Gordon that has propelled the Catamounts as of late. Gordon has scored in double figures in five of his last seven games, while Mutombo averaged 16 points per game to earn second team All-SoCon tournament.

Marshall is coming off a quarterfinal exit from the Conference USA to Tulsa, falling to the Golden Hurricanes, 80-64. Prior to that loss, the Thundering Herd had won eight of its previous nine games including a seven-game winning streak. Marshall has three players averaging double-digit scoring led by Tyler Wilkerson at 14 points per game. Hassan Whiteside, a 7-0 freshman from Gastonia, N.C., ranks second on the Herd squad with 13.6 ppg and a team-high 9.2 rebounds per game with 174 blocks on the season. Rounding out the top three is Damier Pitts averaging 10 points per game.

Tip-off is set for just after 7:00 pm.

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About The CIT: The CollegeInsider.com Tournament is a single-elimination tournament, consisting of four rounds, with the first three rounds being played at on-campus sites, which are determined by seeding. The championship game will be played at an on-campus site to be determined by seeding.

Match-ups are determined by geography and are balanced competitively in regions. This tournament does not work off of a bracket format.

The opening round games are scheduled for March 16-18, the quarterfinal round is scheduled for March 22, the semifinals are set for March 24 and the championship game is set for March 30. The official website of the CIT is CollegeInsider.com.

The tournament is in its second year with Old Dominion taking home the 2009 champions' trophy in the finals over Bradley.