JOHNSON CITY, Tenn. - With a dominating defensive effort and one of its best offensive nights of the season, ETSU wrapped up the regular season Atlantic Sun Conference championship and the No. 1 seed in next week’s league tournament, dropping Stetson in an impressive 84-49 victory Thursday night inside Memorial Center. It is the first A-Sun men’s basketball championship for the Bucs since joining the league in 2005-06.
The regional television audience on CSS witnessed the Buccaneers improve to 21-8 overall, 15-2 in A-Sun play, thanks mainly to a double-double performance from senior Brad Nuckles (Council, Va.), who posted a 19-point, 11-rebound effort. He was joined in double figures by freshman guard Mike Smith (Vandalia, Mo.) with 14 points, while sophomore guard Courtney Pigram (Memphis) netted 12, but the story of the night was the Bucs’ defense, which held Stetson to just 26 percent shooting from the floor.
“I’m proud of our guys and winning the conference championship,” said ETSU head coach Murry Bartow, whose team also wraps up at least a berth to the National Invitation Tournament with the league title. “This game assures us of some postseason play, even though we all want to win the tournament. I think the defense again was the key to us. It has been all year. Holding them to 26 percent shooting was big, and there are a lot of good defensive numbers on the box. We really prepared hard all week for this game and you could see that tonight.”