Introducing Villanova's Opponent: UNC Asheville
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- One of the many great things about the NCAA Tournament is it introduces you to college basketball teams that you probably weren't real familiar with going in.
Chances are, for many people in the Delaware Valley, Villanova's first-round opponent, UNC Asheville, is one of those teams.
The Bulldogs won the Big South Tournament title to earn an automatic bid into the NCAA Tournament. They beat Winthrop in the final, 77-68. That victory improved their record to 22-11. Some other notes from the resume of the Bulldogs: they beat Drexel, 85-66, in the Great Alaskan Shootout back on Thanksgiving and also picked up a 79-73 win on the road at Georgetown on December 19th.
This is the fourth time the Bulldogs have made the NCAA Tournament field in program history (last in 2012) and their first appearance under third-year head coach Nick McDevitt who, prior to taking over as head coach, had spent more than a decade on staff as an assistant and then associate head coach. He also played for UNC Asheville, graduating in 2001.
"We're excited to be a part of the NCAA Tournament," McDevitt tells KYW Newsradio. "Looking forward to Friday and playing Villanova in New York."
Listen to the entire interview with UNC Asheville head coach Nick McDevitt:
If the Bulldogs are going to shock the Wildcats it's going to have to start on the defensive end where they have really been impressive this season.
"We've done a pretty good job of kind of keeping teams out of rhythm, keeping them off-balance a little bit," McDevitt says. "We ended the season #1 in the country at defending the three-point line, statistically at least, our three-point field goal percentage defense (holding opponents to 28.4% from behind the arc). We ended up (sixth) in the country at steals per game (9.3). So I think a lot of our success this year has been based on our performance on that end of the floor."
On offense, McDevitt says his team shares the ball well, a statement backed up by the fact that five players average double figures.
"I think when you do that, it makes your team more difficult to defend," McDevitt says. "When you've just got one or two guys that do the bulk of the scoring, I think you get easier to guard."
The Bulldogs are a young team. In fact, their two top scorers, guards Dylan Smith (13.5 ppg) and Dwayne Sutton (12.0 ppg), are freshmen.
How does McDevitt break down the Wildcats?
"They are hard to guard because of the way they shoot it and they are able to spread you and drive you," McDevitt says. "When you've got that many guys that can do both, you're very difficult to defend as a team. That's going to be a challenge for us. And I think they do a great job of guarding the ball. You look at the way they defend out on the perimeter, it's tough to manufacture easy shots against them."
Villanova and UNC Asheville will tip-off at 12:40pm on Friday in Brooklyn.