Mercer March Madness Breakdown

The Mercer Bears enter the NCAA tournament--for the first time since 1985--on quite a high after beating Florida Gulf Coast on FGCU's home court to win the Atlantic Sun championship and avenge a tough loss last year. They went 26-8 this year, 14-4 in conference and have wins against Seton Hall and on the road versus Mississippi. Also note that this experienced team did not sulk after losing the ASun finals last year but went to Knoxville and beat Tennessee in the first round of the NIT before losing at BYU. They are an excellent and efficient team, quite capable of repeating FGCU's tournament success from last March. Currently they are ranked 10 in the mid majors poll, 101 on KenPom and 105 in BPI. Leading scorer guard Langston Hall (14.7) has been a model of consistency in averaging 14.9 the last seven. He shoot 40% from the floor, 39% from 3 and 86% from the charity stripe. Hall is the only Bear averaging double digits and the rest of the key players have been all over the map down the stretch. Center Daniel Coursey (9.9ppg, 9.6 ppg last 7, 58%FG-73%FT) has also been consistent but he will not be a sexy pick, nor too attractive if he has to butt heads with a talented big or two. Third leading scorer F Bud Thomas (9.1 ppg, 6.3 ppg last 7, 46-39-39) should be avoided after limping in the past two weeks. The fourth leading scorer G Anthony White (8.3 ppg, 12.9 ppg last 7, 47-42-81) is the one to grab late in the bargain bin. He scored 56 pts in the three games of the conference tournament and being a guard is attractive in March. Part of his success is that third guard Ike Nwamu, who scored 24 versus Mississippi, is apparently banged up and not scoring of late (5.1 last 7 versus 8.1 on season). If someone beats you to Hall and White, a nice last round consolation prize would be F Jakob Gillon (7.8 ppg, 10.4 ppg last 7, 44-37-75) who has scored 18-10-17-12 the last four games. If Mercer pulls a beatable high seed then you should pounce on one of the three attractive targets as they could advance and not share points with too many other teams. Don'tignore them because of only one double digit scorer.