'Jacks Picked To Win Southland West
11/3/2010 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Nov. 3, 2010
FRISCO, Texas - The Stephen F. Austin Lumberjack basketball team will open the 2010-11 season looking for its third Southland Conference championship in four years. According to preseason polling of league head coaches and media relations contacts, the rest of the conference expects the Lumberjacks to challenge for that title.
SFA is projected to win the Southland Conference West Division in both Southland preseason polls. The head coaches poll shows the Lumberjacks at the top of the West with 62 points and eight first-place votes. In the sports information directors poll, SFA garnered only five first-place votes but picked up 59 total points to edge Sam Houston State for the top spot.
The Bearkats are behind SFA in the coaches poll with 51 points and two first-place nods. Texas State came in third with 46 points and one first-place vote, and Texas A&M-Corpus Christi is listed fourth with 35 points and a first-place vote.
Sam Houston actually picked up six first-place votes -- one more than the Lumberjacks -- in SID polling but got edged by three points in the overall tally. A&M-Corpus is listed third with 40 points and one first-place vote.
In the East Division, Nicholls is tabbed to win by the head coaches, while Southeastern Louisiana got the first-place nod in the SID poll.
This season marks SFA's return to the West Division after two years in the Southland East. The move back to the West is a permanent one, ending a system that saw SFA and Lamar alternate divisions every two years.
The Lumberjacks open play on Nov. 12 with a home game against Howard Payne. The contest tips off at 7 p.m. from the William R. Johnson Coliseum.
-- SFA --
