Mercer Hosts St. Andrews In Exhibition Contest

Tuesday, October 29

Macon, Ga.

7 p.m.

Mercer University

St. Andrews (Exh.)

Photo by: Judy Stapleton

Mercer Hosts St. Andrews In Exhibition Contest

10/28/2019 6:53:00 PM | Men's Basketball

Bears set to open the season Tuesday at Hawkins Arena in Exhibition Play

By: Travis Rae

MACON, Ga. – Basketball season is upon us in Macon, Georgia. The Mercer men's basketball takes to the hardwood for the first time this season on Tuesday, Oct. 29 when they host St. Andrews in an FREE Exhibition contest at Hawkins Arena.

GAME DAY LINEUP
Date: Tuesday, Oct. 29, 2019 | 7 p.m. (ET)
Teams: St. Andrews (0-0) vs. Mercer (0-0)
Location: Macon, Ga. | Hawkins Arena
Live Stats: MercerBears.com/LiveStats
Radio: 100.9 The Creek FM and SportsMic – Rick Cameron
Twitter Updates: @MercerMBB

SERIES HISTORY
• Overall: Mercer leads 2-0
• Current Streak: W2
• Last Meeting: W, 66-33 at Mercer (12/2/14)

BEAR NECESSITIES

The Bears will have a new look this season. Mercer welcomes seven newcomers to this years' team. The Bears welcomed in three true freshmen and four transfers to the team this season.
Mercer enters the season with three seniors, Ross Cummings, Ethan Stair, and Djordje Dimitrijevic.
This will be the third time in program history that the Bears and Knights have met on the hardwood. The Bears have never lost to St. Andrews. The only two meetings between these two teams came during the 2013-14 and 2014-15 season.

ABOUT THE KNIGHTS
St. Andrews is coming off a season that they went 9-18 in the Appalachian Athletic Conference. The Knights won its last game of the season, 66-61, against Bluefield on Feb. 16, 2019. Warren Vinson led the team in scoring last season averaging 15.4 points per game. Vinson graduated following last season. Junior Isaac Clay returns to the team this season. Clay averaged 8.0 points last year, the second-most on the team. As a team, St. Andrews averaged 73.6 points per game while allowing 80.3 points per game. They shot 42.4 percent from the floor and 34.3 from behind the arc. Jamaan Bailey led the team last season hitting 53 three-pointers. Coach Randy Hernandez is in his fifth season at the helm.

NEW COACH, NEW ERA
The Bears will be under the direction of first-year head coach Greg Gary. Gary was named the Bears head coach on March 26. A veteran assistant coach with 26 years at the NCAA Division I level, Gary has spent the last eight seasons working under Matt Painter at Purdue University. Joining Coach Gary on staff this year is assistant coaches, Bobby Kummer, Kim Lewis, and Juan Cardona.

RETURNING SCORERS FROM 2018-19
Mercer returns three of the top four scorers from the 2018-19 team. Besides Ross Cummings, Mercer returns Ethan Stair and Djordje Dimitrijevic. Stair finished second on the team last year averaging 11.7 points per game and led the team in rebounding averaging 5.2 per game. Dimitrijevic finished fourth on the team averaging 9.6 points per game.

1,000 POINT SCORERS
Both Ross Cummings and Ethan Stair are closing into on becoming the Bears 41^st and 42^nd 1,000-career scores in Mercer History. Entering the season, Ross Cummings has scored 803 career points, while Ethan Stair has scored 704 points. Sitting in 40^th on the 1,000 point club for Mercer is Dartez Talbott who scored 1,014 points in his career at Mercer, which stretched from the 1979-81 seasons. James Florence, who played for the Bears from 2006-10, is the all-time leading scorer as he scored 2,286 points. Florence is the only 2,000 point scorers in Mercer history.

3-POINT FIELD GOALS
Not only is Ross Cummings closing in at 1,000 points but he is closing in on becoming the all-time leading three-point field goals leader. In his three years at Mercer, Cummings has hit 162 three-pointers, which ranks fourth all-time. He is 94 threes away from tying the career record holder of Langston Hall, who hit 256 threes.

PRESEASON ALL-SoCON TEAM
Mercer guard Ross Cummings, a 6-3 senior from Dickson, Tenn., has been selected to the preseason All-SoCon Team. Cummings started all 31 games a year ago and averaged 17.4 points per game. He hit 101 three-pointers last year, which was the second-most made in a single season in school history. Over his first three years of his career, Cummings has made 162 three-pointers, ranking him fourth all-time at Mercer. On three different occasions, Cummings set new career-highs for scoring. On Nov. 27, 2018, against Brewton-Parker, he scored 31 points. The career-high points changed 36 on Jan. 10 against Western Carolina. A month and a half later, he scored 37 points, setting another career-high against Chattanooga. His 37-point contest came at Hawkins Arena. This second-highest total scored by a Mercer player at Hawkins Arena. The only player to score more was James Florence who scored 39 points, a Mercer single-game high, on Feb. 16, 2007.

PRESEASON SoCON RANKINGS
The Bears were predicted to finish eighth in both the coaches and media polls. Mercer finished 6-12 in league play last season, earning the sixth seed in the conference tournament. The Bears went on to finish the campaign 11-20 overall. Below you can find the coaches and media polls.

2019-20 Preseason Southern Conference Coaches Poll
Team (1^st-place votes)               Total
1. ETSU (8)                                   80
2. UNCG (2)                                  74
3. Furman                                     61
4. Wofford                                   52
5. Samford                                   48
6. Chattanooga                           41
7. Western Carolina                   38
8. Mercer                                     29
9. The Citadel                              16
10. VMI                                        11

2019-20 Preseason Southern Conference Media Poll
Team (1^st-place votes)                Total
1. ETSU (20)                                  286
2. UNCG (6)                                  264
3. Furman (4)                               245
4. Wofford                                    216
5. Samford                                    169
6. Chattanooga                            128
7. Western Carolina             117
8. Mercer                                      115
9. The Citadel                               70
10. VMI                                        40

SoCON CHAMPIONSHIP
The 2020 Ingles SoCon Men's Basketball Championship presented by General Shale will be held March 6-9 at Harrah's Cherokee Center Asheville in Asheville, North Carolina. The 2020 edition of the tournament is the 100^th for the nation's oldest collegiate conference basketball tournament.

WHAT'S NEXT
Mercer opens up the 2019-20 regular season on Wednesday, Nov. 6 when they travel to Queens, N.Y. to face St. John's. Tipoff is set for 6:30 p.m. The matchup against St. John's will be aired on FS1.

How to Follow the Bears:
For complete coverage of Mercer Basketball, please follow the Bears on social media at @MercerMBB (Twitter), /MercerBasketball (Facebook) and @Mercer_MBB (Instagram) or visit the official home of Mercer Athletics at MercerBears.com.