March 11, 2012

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LOS ANGELES - For the second time in three seasons, the LMU men's basketball program will play in the postseason, earning a bid to the fourth annual CollegeInsider.com Postseason Touranment (CIT). The Lions will host cross-town foe Cal State Fullerton in the first round on Wednesday, March 14 at Gersten Pavilion. Game time is set for 7 p.m., and can be heard on KXLU 88.9 FM and will be streamed online through the CIT Tournament Central.

"We are honored to return to the postseason and to be playing a program as talented and well coached as Cal State Fullerton," said Head Coach Max Good. "This will be a great opportunity for us."

For the first time since the conference began in 1969, LMU did not have a Big West Conference foe on the regular season schedule in 2011-12. However, the Titans will continue that streak when they come in for the CIT first round.

"They are a great team who had a very good season," said Good of the Titans, who finished 21-9 overall and tied for second in the league standings at 12-4. They fell in the Big West Conference Tournament quarterfinals to UC Irvine, 65-59.

LMU enters the tournament at 19-11, going 11-5 in the West Coast Conference. Both win totals are the most since the 1989-90 Elite Eight season.

This will be 25th meeting between the two programs, the first since Dec. 30, 2003 when the Lions won 71-67 on the road. The Titans lead the series 13-11 with the series even at 5-5 when played at LMU.

LMU is led by first-team All-WCC selections Anthony Ireland and Drew Viney, who enter the tournament averaging 15.5 and 15.0 points, respectively. As for Fullerton, all five starters average double figures, led by D.J. Seeley's 16.8 points per game.

This is the fourth CIT with the previous three drawing from 20 different conferences. The Lions played in the 2010 CIT, hosting Pacific in the first round, falling 86-76. Pacific went on to the title game, falling to Missouri State, 78-65. The WCC's Santa Clara won the 2011 CIT, defeating Iona, 76-69.

The CIT consists of six rounds, including a unique second round which the top-4 remaining seeds receive byes. This insures that the first round of the tournament is not perceived as a "play-in" round. All six rounds are played at on-campus sites, which are determined by seeding.

Teams will be bracketed geographically. Brackets can be found at CIT Tournament Central.