Three champions will be crowned today: despite the fact that nearly everyone else will be meeting these teams for the first time today, we know how hard these players and coaches have worked to get to this point. Each winner today will be referred to as "champion" around these parts for the next year, and since we have the utmost respect for the runner-ups' struggles as well, we'll tell the tales of how close they came.And the second bid of the year (congrats,
Penn!) will be handed out in the New Big South. That's right, not the Old one. In the Old Big South, Winthrop ran the table and only lost when when random chance said they had to. Now, the Eagles have a worthy adversary in Coastal Carolina. Much has been made of the Chants' season sweep, but let's look deeper. In the two CCU wins, they outrebounded Winthrop by a combined nine boards -- in 2005-06 league play, Winthrop was not outrebounded on any other occasion. So this makes 6-10 banger/press quarterback
Craig Bradshaw today's central figure: contain him, and Coastal can steal this title.