Mountaineers ready for first tournament

The Appalachian Online Appalachian State men’s basketball will make their Sun Belt Conference tournament debut on March 8 at 7 p.m. in New Orleans against Troy, who is the sixth seed in the tournament.
“For our young team, it’s exciting to participate in the Sun Belt Tournament.” head coach Jim Fox said in a coaches teleconference on March 6. “I know our guys have had a lot of energy these last couple days in practice. It’ll be learning experience for us, and hopefully a learning experience we can build on.”
This season, the Mountaineers finished 11th in the conference standings with a 4-14 record in conference, and benefited from the Sun Belt Conference’s addition of Coastal Carolina, which led to the reformatting and inclusion of all 12 Sun Belt teams in the conference tournament.  
Despite finishing with a poor conference record, the Mountaineers competed in almost every game they played in, and all four of their conference wins came against some of the top teams in the Sun Belt.
This year marks the first year Appalachian State has made the Sun Belt conference tournament, and the first time App State has played in a conference tournament since their final Southern Conference tournament appearance in 2014.
It is also Fox’s conference tournament debut as a head coach. Before becoming a head coach, Fox was an assistant under coach Bob McKillop at Davidson, where he won six conference tournaments, which resulted in six NCAA tournament appearances.
The 2017 Sun Belt conference is one of many storylines. Number one seed UT-Arlington will look to win their first ever Sun Belt Tournament, and return to the NCAA tournament for the first time since 2008. South Alabama, the current conference member with the most Sun Belt conference tournament championships with five, goes in as the ninth seed, and last season’s tournament champion, Arkansas-Little ...


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