Orediggers to host Wayland Baptist in NAIA first round. Who is Wayland Baptist?

The following is from the Montana Tech Sports Information Department:

BUTTE, Mont.- The National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) announced that the Orediggers of Montana Tech would be one of the 16 host sites where the first and second-round games of the National Championship, presented by Ballogy, would be played.  Montana Tech also hosted first and second-round games a year ago, the first time in school history.  The Orediggers are the No. 3 seed in the Naismith Quadrant and will play the 14th seed Pioneers from Wayland Baptist. The other matchup in Butte has the 11th-seeded Warriors of Lewis Clark State taking on the 6-seed Hope International (California).

Wayland Baptist University is located in Plainview, Texas, with approximately 1100 students enrolled in its Plainview campus with nearly 4,000 total students across extension campuses. The Pioneers (21-9, 15-7) play in the Sooner Athletic Conference where they finished the regular season in fourth place. They won their first game in the SAC tournament 109-108 over the University of Science and Arts (Okla.) before falling to No. 2 Langston 67-84.

Wayland Baptist received an At-Large bid into this year's NAIA National Tournament, making it to the dance in back-to-back years. As a program the Pioneers are very familiar with the National Tournament, this being their 22^nd appearance in the tournament, with an overall Championship record of 11-20.

The Pioneers have averaged 82.2 points per game this year on 48.3% shooting, including 37% from the 3-point line. Their 82 ppg was good for third third-highest in the SAC. They are holding their opponents to 40.5% shooting, which is 2^nd highest in the SAC, and they are outrebounding opponents by 6.7 boards a game, also 2^nd highest in the SAC. On the season, they are holding their opponents to 70.1 ppg.

Individually, the Pioneers are led in scoring by Linton Brown at 18 points a game, in 17 games played. According to the Pioneer website he hasn’t played since January 20^th against No.2 Langston.

Quenton Coleman, a junior transfer guard from Temple, finished the regular season averaging 14.2 ppg. Quenton played in 19 games this season, and in those games, he had 5 contests with over 20 points and one game with 30. He shot 47% from the field, and an impressive 45% from the arc.

The Pioneers have three other players who average double figures in scoring, D’Michael Bellfield at 13.1, Tahjae Hill at 12.6, Meikkel Murray at 11.7 points per game.

6’9” D’Michael Bellfield is their leading rebounder, pulling down 6.3 rebounds a game.

The Pioneers will play the third seed, Montana Tech at 7 pm on Friday on Kelvin Sampson court. This will be the very first meeting between the two programs. The winner of Friday’s game will advance to the second round to play the winner of the other Friday matchup between Lewis-Clark State and Hope International.

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