ECU To Face Louisville In C-USA First Round Game

ECU To Face Louisville In C-USA First Round Game

03/07/2004

CHICAGO - No. 6 seed Louisville (19-8, 9-7) faces 11th-seeded East Carolina (13-13, 5-11) in Wednesday's 7 p.m. first round game. The Cardinals won in Greenville on Jan. 15, 76-66. The winner of this matchup advances to face No. 3 seed and 14th-ranked Cincinnati in Thursday's 7:00 p.m. quarterfinal. Cincinnati has advanced to at least the semifinal round in six of the first eight C-USA Tournaments.

The closest conference race in college basketball has ended in a five-way tie for first place. Charlotte, Cincinnati, DePaul, Memphis and UAB have all finished with identical league records of 12-4. Based on tie-breaker procedures, DePaul will be the top seed at the 2004 Kelly Tires Conference USA Men's Basketball Tournament in Cincinnati. The four day, 12-team event will be held Wednesday-Saturday, March 10-13 at U.S. Bank Arena on the riverfront in downtown Cincinnati.

Twice Conference USA has had two schools share the regular season championship, but never has more than two schools earned a piece of the crown. For Cincinnati, it has now won at least a share of eight of the conference's nine regular season titles. Memphis gains a piece of its second title, as the Tigers split the league's first regular season championship with UC back in 1996. Charlotte, DePaul and UAB all won titles in other leagues during the 1990's. Charlotte captured the final regular season title of the Metro Conference in 1995, DePaul shared the inaugural Great Midwest Conference championship with Cincinnati in 1992 and UAB won the 1990 Sun Belt Conference title.

Tournament play gets underway Wednesday at 1 p.m. when No. 5 seed Charlotte (20-7, 12-4) meets 12th-seeded Tulane (11-16, 4-12). Two opening round games will air on ESPN 2 and the first semifinal on Friday will air on ESPN. All other games on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday will be shown on ESPN Plus. Please check your local listings. Saturday's 11:41 a.m. final will be aired nationally on CBS.

2004 KELLY TIRES CONFERENCE USA TOURNAMENT SCHEDULE

Wednesday, March 10 (First Round)
(5) Charlotte vs. (12) Tulane (ESPN 2) 1:00p
(8) Marquette vs. (9) TCU (ESPN 2) 3:30p
(6) Louisville vs. (11) East Carolina (ESPN Plus) 7:00p
(7) Saint Louis vs. (10) Southern Miss (ESPN Plus) 9:30p

Thursday, March 11 (Quarterfinals)
CHA/TUL vs. (4) UAB (ESPN Plus) 1:00p
MAR/TCU vs. (1) DePaul (ESPN Plus) 3:30p
LOU/ECU vs. (3) Cincinnati (ESPN Plus) 7:00p
SLU/USM vs. (2) Memphis (ESPN Plus) 9:30p

Friday, March 12 (Semifinals)
Semifinal No. 1 (ESPN) 4:30p
Semifinal No. 2 (ESPN Plus) 7:00p

Saturday, March 13
Championship Game (CBS) 11:41p All times Eastern

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