By Kristin Callahan
 |
| (Atlantic Sun) |
Once a rookie
tournament team, Belmont is becoming familiar with March Madness. The 14-seeded
Bruins will take on No. 3 seed Georgetown in Friday’s opening round of the
Midwest Regional. Belmont makes its fifth tournament appearance in seven years.
The Bruins began the season by losing by a point against Duke.
Senior guard
Drew Hanlen said that he and the Bruins came into the season with three goals:
to win the Atlantic Sun Conference regular-season title, the conference
tournament and “multiple games in the NCAA tournament.”
Last year's first-round loss to Wisconsin is still fresh in Belmont’s minds.
"We've been waiting for this day since that Wisconsin loss last
year," said the 5-foot-11 Hanlen, who made 48 percent of his 3-point tries
this season.
The Hoyas are anticipating tournament play as well, but for completely
different reasons. Georgetown has made an early first round exit the past two
years. The Hoyas don’t want to see history repeat itself.
"We all know what happened," said senior guard Jason Clark, one of
only three upperclassmen on Georgetown's roster. "It's definitely a
motivator. Everybody has it in the back of their mind. We try not to focus on
it. We know we didn't do it in those games. So we want to learn from our
mistakes, and that's what we've been working all year for."
Georgetown will try and put a stop to Belmont’s 14-game winning streak
and a stop to a history of early exits.
Tipoff is at 3:10 EST on Friday in Columbus, OH. The game will be broadcast on truTV.
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