With only four returning scholarship letterwinners on his roster for this season, Coach Scott Sanderson has utilized every opportunity in the 2011-12 men’s basketball schedule to get his young team ready for the postseason.
In a normal season, the Bisons would play 29 games plus an exhibition. This season however, Lipscomb uses two separate NCAA exemptions to boost this number to 30 games behind an exhibition and a five-game foreign tour for a total of 36 contests.
After opening the season with home games against Fort Valley State University (Nov. 11) and Gardner-Webb (Nov. 13), Lipscomb will participate in the Cancun Shootout, a four-game exempt tournament that only counts as three games towards schedule limits. The Cancun Shootout actually starts in the United States and not Mexico with the Bisons traveling to Illinois (Nov. 17) and Illinois State (Nov. 19).
Lipscomb will then fly from Chicago to Cancun to play two games in the “Mayan Division” against SIU Edwardsville (Nov. 22) and either Hampton or Sacred Heart the following day.
Lipscomb opens a four-game home stand with Austin Peay on Monday, Nov. 28. Lipscomb defeated Austin Peay twice last season restarting an old rivalry between two teams an hour apart that hadn’t played each other for nearly half a century.
The Bisons open conference action against Mercer (Dec. 1) and Kennesaw State (Dec. 3) before hosting UT Martin (Dec. 6) in a final home game before spending the next six weeks on the road. Lipscomb plays their third and fourth Ohio Valley Conference opponent in a three-week period when traveling to Tennessee Tech (Dec. 10) and Murray State (Dec. 15)
The Bisons head to Memphis (Dec. 19) and Iowa State (Dec. 21) for back-to-back marquee games before a break for Christmas. Lipscomb plays their final 16 Atlantic Sun Conference tilts after the New Year starting with road games against Jacksonville (Jan. 2) and North Florida (Jan. 4). The Bisons seven-game road stretch concludes on Friday, Jan. 6, with the short three-mile road trip to face Belmont. In their final year in the A-Sun Conference, Belmont returns to Allen Arena on Friday, Feb. 3, for the second “Battle of the Boulevard” matchup.
Seniors Jordan Burgason, Justin Glenn and Brett Staal will be honored at Lipscomb’s final home game against the ETSU Bucs on Monday, Feb. 20.
For the third consecutive year the Atlantic Sun Championship will return to the University Center on the campus of Mercer University in Macon, Ga., from Feb. 29 to Mar. 3.
The Bisons travel to the Dominican Republic next week to play five games in a “foreign tour” which the NCAA allows schools to play in once every four years. Sanderson’s Bisons are currently in the middle of the ten practice dates allowed prior to the tour.
Lipscomb plays one exhibition game on Thursday, Nov. 3, against former NAIA rival Freed-Hardeman.
Season tickets and mini-packages are on sale now through the Lipscomb athletic ticket office and online by clicking here. Season tickets are $150 while mini-packages start at $45 for the ultimate convenience of fans that may not be suited for a season ticket.
Story used with permission from LipscombSports.com