The Notre Dame College Falcons for the second straight season will open the campaign against Slippery Rock in the Conference Challenge hosted by Fairmont State. The host Fighting Falcons will battle Millersville in Friday's first game at 6 PM, before NDC will take on Slippery Rock at 8 PM. On Saturday NDC will battle Millersville at 4 PM- before Fairmont State will take on Slippery Rock in the nightcap.
NDC knocked off Slippery Rock in this event a season ago on a Will Vorhees jumper with three seconds to go.
NDC is coming off a 23-9 season and the first trip to the NCAA tournament in school history. This included the school's first ever tournament title, as MEC Champs back in March.
A lot has changed for NDC since March. Head Coach Mark Richmond was hired back in July, as he is a head coach for the first time. Richmond spent the past two seasons as the Director of Basketball Operations at Youngstown State. He hired assistant coach Duncan Williams to join his staff . Williams is at NDC after spending the past eight seasons at Alderson Broaddus.
On the court the Falcons have a trio of seniors returning who will start this season. Larenz Thurman- Bruce Hodges- and- Drew Scarberry will look to build off of last March going into the season- and- will attempt to fill the void left by Vorhees who was last season's Division II Player Of The Year. Thurman, who was a First Team All-MEC performer and averaged 16.9 points to go along with nearly five assists a game- and- shot 47 percent from the 3-point line returns. Bruce Hodges, who was also on the MEC Tournament All-Tournament team returns as well. He led the team with 51 steals last season. He also averaged nine points a game, including 22 in the MEC Championship Game. Scarberry put up 10.2 points a game a season ago- and- shot 38 percent from the 3-point line. Levi Frankland returns after sitting out last season with an injury. Frankland averaged 8.8 points per game in the 2017-18 season. The Falcons will also look to incorporate a slew of newcomer's including Jordan Burton- Rahmel Thompson- and- Dae John Walker- Bey.
NDC upset Division I Cleveland State in an exhibition on October 30th 69-64. Frankland and Scarberry scored 15 points each, while Thurman added 11. The NDC defense held CSU to 28 percent shooting from the field- and- one of 12 from the 3-point line in the second half.
Hodges talked about the upcoming Conference Challenge:
" We gotta come out ready to play. We must defend and rebound! And we have to stay together thru tough times."
Scarberry talked about focusing on his team:
" It doesn't matter who we are playing to be honest. We have to come ready to play our game and make teams change to our style of play. Then we control the game."
Slippery Rock went 19-10 last season and 16-5 in the PSAC. They were bounced in the first round of the PSAC Tournament a season ago. "The Rock" returns both Micah Till and Jared Armstrong from a season ago. Till did not appear in either of the team's exhibition games against Pitt or Rider. Armstrong was solid in both games, scoring 23 points versus Rider and 12 versus Pitt. Will Robinson was also solid for Slippery Rock in exhibition play. A season ago "The Rock" scored 79.5 points per game- while they allowed 73.5 per contest. One thing Coach Ian Grady's bunch did exceptionally well was block shots, as they averaged 5.7 blocks per game last season.
Millersville went 16-13 last season and 11-9 in the PSAC. The Marauders are picked to finish fourth in the PSAC East. They return Jaden Faulkner, who averaged 14.3 points and 5.3 rebounds per game last season- along with James Sullivan who averaged 9.1 points per game last year. They average 77.8 points per game as a team- while they allowed 71.1 per contest.
As always you can catch all the action on NotreDameFalcons.com
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