HARROGATE, Tenn. – The No. 1 Railsplitters will collide with rival Carson-Newman for the 206th time in program history on Wednesday night when Lincoln Memorial (25-1, 18-0 SAC) puts its record 32-game South Atlantic Conference winning streak on the line against the Eagles (21-5, 13-5 SAC) with an 8 p.m. tip-off at Tex Turner Arena.
Winners of 14 straight games overall, the Railsplitters begin the final week of the regular season with hopes of extending a 20-game winning streak in Harrogate. A win would also push Lincoln Memorial one away from clinching its sixth consecutive SAC regular-season title and the second perfect conference record in league history.
The Railsplitters completed their regular-season road schedule on Saturday with a trip to Hartsville, S.C. to face the Coker Cobras. Lincoln Memorial was locked in a dogfight for most that contest but used a late 8-0 scoring run to lead the way to an 85-70 triumph. In his return from a one-game absence due to illness,
Emanuel Terry led the way to victory with 21 points, 13 rebounds and four blocks, while
Trevon Shaw poured in 19 points and
Dorian Pinson added 18 points, 14 rebounds and four assists.
Those three Bevo Francis Award top 50 candidates have been the catalysts for the entirety of the Railsplitters' eighth consecutive 25-win season. Shaw is ranked fourth in the SAC in scoring with 18.5 points per game and has hit a nation-leading 118 three-pointers, 22 shy of the SAC and program record. Terry is fifth in the conference in scoring with 18.3 points per game and leads the league in field-goal percentage (72.7), rebounds per game (10.6) and blocks (47). Pinson is among the top 15 in the league in scoring (14.5ppg), rebounds per game (9.1) and total assists (118).
As the Railsplitters inch ever closer to the second unbeaten SAC record in league and program history, Carson-Newman will look to play spoiler on Wednesday night. The Eagles have played the role before when they abruptly ended Lincoln Memorial's 20-0 start to the 2014-15 campaign with an 87-72 win over the then No. 1 ranked Railsplitters at Tex Turner Arena.
However, Lincoln Memorial has won five of the last six meeting in the series and the last three have been in landslide fashion. That stretch began last January when the Railsplitters picked up a 108-76 win over the Eagles at Tex Turner Arena. LMU then ended Carson-Newman's 2016-17 season with a 105-62 beatdown in the SAC Championship semifinals. That one-sided trend continued back on January 17 of this year as LMU housed the Eagles 108-69 to hand Carson-Newman its worst loss ever at Holt Fieldhouse.
In that contest, the Railsplitters shot 57.7 percent from the field, went 18-for-34 from three-point range and held Carson-Newman to 33.8 percent shooting, including an 8-for-29 effort from three-point range. Shaw went 8-for-14 from three to score a game-high 30 points, while Terry had 27 points, 12 rebounds and two blocks. Pinson nearly had a triple-double with 13 points, 13 rebounds and nine assists.
Carson-Newman has been playing some solid basketball since that loss, though, with wins in six of its last eight games. The Eagles' only losses over that span were a weird 78-77 setback at Mars Hill on January 24 that was decided by a controversial last-second technical foul call and an 82-66 loss to No. 2 ranked Queens on February 10.
The Eagles rebounded from that loss to the Royals with a 112-103 win over Tusculum last Wednesday and a 104-89 victory at Catawba on Saturday. They enter the final week of the regular season in third place in the SAC standings with no chance of falling out of the top four.
Carson-Newman is led by SAC Player of the Year candidate Charles Clark, a senior guard who won his fifth AstroTurf SAC Player of the Week honor of the 2017-18 campaign on Tuesday morning. Clark – who was last season's SAC Player of the Year - leads the conference in scoring with 21.6 points per game and is shooting 50 percent from the field and 43 percent from three-point range. On top of that, Clark has handed out the fifth-most assists in the SAC with 108.
Clark has scored 20-plus points in 14 of his 26 appearances this season, including a 21-point effort in the first meeting against Lincoln Memorial. However, the Railsplitters made Clark work for those 21 points, holding the Murfreesboro, Tenn. native to 5-for-16 shooting and a 2-for-8 clip from three.
Behind Clark are four players averaging double figures. Shaun Jones is putting up 12.4 points and 5.7 rebounds per game while shooting 61.8 percent from the field. Malik Abraham is contributing 12.0 points per game on 45 percent shooting, while Grant Teichmann (10.1ppg, 4.1rpg) and Mason Bates (10.0ppg, 5.8rpg) have also been solid contributors.
Jones and Abraham scored 12 points apiece in the first meeting against Lincoln Memorial this season, but those two guys combined to go 10-for-26 from the field. Nobody else scored more than eight points for the Eagles.
Tip-off between the Railsplitters and Eagles is set for 8 p.m. at Tex Turner Arena. The game will be broadcast locally on MyVLT while audio and live stats links will be available at www.lmurailsplitters.com.
Quick Hits:
- Lincoln Memorial and Carson-Newman have been rivals since 1923 with 205 all-time meetings between the two programs. The Railsplitters own a narrow 104-101 edge in the series with 58-40 record in Harrogate.
- Carson-Newman was receiving votes in the most recent D2SIDA top 25 poll as well as the NABC/Division II coaches rankings.
- The Eagles get to the free-throw line in bunches, averaging the second-most free throw attempts per game (23.4) with the most makes per game (16.6) in the conference.
- Ten of the last 11 games in the series have been decided by double digits. The only exception was Carson-Newman's 111-109 overtime win last season at Holt Fieldhouse.
