Mercer Men’s Basketball Primed for Showdown with FGCU

FORT MYERS, Fla. (MERCER RELEASE) – The Mercer men’s basketball team puts its sole ownership of the Atlantic Sun Conference lead on the line Friday night against Florida Gulf Coast at Alico Arena. The game is set to be nationally televised by ESPNU and is slated for a 6 p.m. start.

Mercer (21-6, 12-2 A-Sun) holds a one game lead on FGCU for first place in the league standings with four games to play, and has already clinched hosting duties for the first round of the Atlantic Sun Tournament. A win on Friday would be a significant step in the Bears’ progress towards winning the league’s regular season title in consecutive years.

SCOUTING FGCU

FGCU has won five of its last six games and enters Friday night’s contest at 17-10 (11-3 A-Sun). The Eagles are 11-1 at home this season, with the lone loss at the hands of Iona on Dec. 1, 2013.

The Eagles return four starters and nine letterwinners from last year’s team that went 26-11 (13-5 A-Sun) and advanced to the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Tournament. The Eagles were picked to win the league in a preseason poll of A-Sun coaches, while junior Brett Comer, junior Bernard Thompson and senior Chase Fieler all picked up Preseason All-Conference honors.

Thompson, Comer and Fieler all average double-figure scoring and rank among the league’s top-12 scoring players. Thompson paces the team at 16.0 points per game, fourth best in the league’s scoring standings.

The Eagles are under direction of first-year head coach Joe Dooley, who signed on with the school after spending three seasons as an Assistant Coach at Kansas. Dooley has previously been a head coach at East Carolina, where he led the Pirates to a 69-60 record in four seasons.

FAST FACTS

Bud Thomas became the 38th member of Mercer’s 1,000-point club last time out, joining teammates Langston Hall and Jakob Gollon in the exclusive group. Mercer is one of just seven schools nationally to start three 1,000-point scorers.

Mercer is one of 18 teams to have 21 wins or more in each of the last 3 seasons. The only other mid-major programs in that group are Wichita State and Gonzaga.

Langston Hall is the reigning A-Sun player of the week after averaging 22.5 points per game against Lipscomb and Northern Kentucky. The award was his second A-Sun weekly honor the season. Bud Thomas, Jakob Gollon and Ike Nwamu have also received confernece weeklyawards this season.

Mercer’s win over Lipscomb last Friday established the Bears’ third-straight 20-win season. Prior to last year, Mercer had never had consecutive 20-win seasons.

Mercer has had at least a 15-point lead in 10 of its 14 conference games this year and a 30-point lead in five league games.

The Bears’ No. 9 spot this week’s CollegeInsider.com Mid-Major Top 25 is a program-best. Mercer has been featured in the poll for nine-straight weeks.

The program record for conference wins in a season is 14, done twice by the 2002-03 and 2012-13 editions of the team. To best that mark, the Bears will have to go at least 3-1 in their final four regular season games.