MEN'S SOCCER NCAA ROUND OF 32: TOURNAMENT/GAME PREVIEW, TICKET INFO AND MORE
Hartsville, SC - After the heartbreak of the South Atlantic Conference Semifinal upset at the hands of the Lenoir-Rhyne Bears, the Cobras trek on into the national tournament with one goal in mind: Bring a trophy back to Hartsville.
Tournament Structure:
The Cobras, once ranked as the number-one team in the Southeast Region, came out of the selection show with the third seed due to the upset in the tournament. The full national field is a forty-team bracket split up into four super-regions of ten teams seeded one through ten. This means that there will be two "rat-tail" games in the first round: the 7/10 seed match-up and the 8/9 seed match-up. In the Southeast Region, these match-ups include (7) West Florida vs (10) Flagler (hosted by Lynn in Boca Raton, FL) and (8) Mars Hill vs (9) Francis Marion (hosted by Mars Hill in Mars Hill, NC). Both of these match-ups will take place on Friday, November 22nd at 3:00 PM ET.
The Winner of the 7/10 matchup will face off against (2) Lynn in Boca Raton. The winner of the 8/9 match-up will face off against (1) Limestone, with that game being held in Mars Hill due to Limestone hosting the DII Field Hockey Nationals that same weekend. Other match-ups include (4) Clayton State vs (5) Converse (hosted by Converse in Spartanburg, SC due to no host bid put in by Clayton State) and your (3) Cobras facing off against (6) Auburn-Montgomery here in Hartsville. The entirety of the second round will be held on Sunday, November 24th at 3:00 PM ET.
Game Preview:
Now that we've laid out the tournament for you, let's dive into your Cobras' first-round match-up against the sixth-seeded Warhawks of Auburn-Montgomery.
As you may already know, Coker received an at-large bid into the tournament despite losing in their conference tournament. Their entire body of work, along with spending almost the entirety of the season ranked in the top ten nationally, still earned them a home match-up in the second round. The Warhawks, however, are in an entirely different situation. They received their conference's automatic qualifier (AQ) after they won the Gulf South Conference postseason tournament as the third seed. They had a massive 5-2 win over Trevecca Nazarene in the first round, a 1-1 (5-3 on penalty kicks) thriller over the second-seeded Christian Brothers in the semifinal, and then a great 1-0 win over first-seeded West Florida in the final (who earned an at-large bid).
Had they lost in their tournament at any point, they were unlikely to receive an at large bid, so their unlikely road to a postseason conference title is what ended them up in this position. The 11-2-6 Warhawks did just enough to earn the right to come to Coker to face off against the Cobras, and they will look to start another unprecedented run as they did in their conference tournament.
The Warhawks have had a solid season, with their best wins coming against three nationally ranked opponents in the forms of Tampa (2-0 win on September 7th), Mississippi College (3-0 win on November 3rd), and West Florida (1-0 win on November 16th). In terms of common opponents, the two teams only shared one this season: Carson-Newman. Auburn-Montgomery tied the Eagles 0-0 on September 19th, while the Cobras defeated them 4-2 on September 21st. This will be the first meeting in history between the two programs and will provide an exciting atmosphere here on the Coker Athletic Turf on Sunday.
Ticket Info:
Adult (Ages 13+): $10
Seniors (Ages 60+): $5
Active/Retired Military: $5
Youth (Ages 6-12): $5
Coker Students (With ID): $3
First 100 Coker Students WITH ID: FREE
Tickets can be purchased online through this link.
Game and Facility Info:
Event: NCAA Men's Soccer Round of 32
Participants: (3) Coker (14-2-1) vs. (6) Auburn-Montgomery (11-2-6)
Date/Time: Sunday, November 24th, at 3:00 PM ET
Location: Coker Athletic Turf - Hartsville, SC
Streaming: FloSports