SUN BELT MEN'S BASKETBALL POSTSEASON NOTES

NEW ORLEANS — Sun Belt tournament champion Georgia State learned its NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Tournament destination on Selection Sunday.
 
The Panthers earned a No. 16 seed and will take on No. 1-seeded Gonzaga in a West Region first-round contest in Portland, Ore., at 4:15 p.m. ET / 3:15 p.m. CT on TNT. 
 
Georgia State will ride a 10-game winning streak into March Madness in their sixth all-time appearance (1991, 2001, 2015, 2018, 2019, 2022), following their fourth all-time Sun Belt tournament crown (2015, 2018, 2019, 2022).
 
The Panthers—the Sun Belt preseason favorite—battled through early-season adversity and an 0-4 start in conference play to win their third Hercules Tires Sun Belt Conference Men’s Basketball Championship title over the past four events.
 
In five prior appearances in the Big Dance, Georgia State owns a pair of victories—50-49 over No. 6-seeded Wisconsin as a No. 11 seed in 2001 and 57-56 over No. 3-seeded Baylor as a No. 14 seed in 2015.
 
The Panthers current roster boasts three of the Top 25 scorers in program history—All-Sun Belt Third Team senior guard Kane Williams (12.5 PPG, 3.8 APG), All-Sun Belt Third Team & Tournament Most Outstanding Player senior guard Corey Allen (14.7 PPG, 3.6 RPG) and senior guard Justin Roberts (11.2 PPG, 3.1 RPG). All-Tournament Team pick senior forward Eliel Nsoseme (9.4 PPG, 9.8 RPG) is averaging nearly a double-double after three-straight double-double efforts in Pensacola. Junior forward Jalen Thomas (7.7 PPG, 6.1 RPG) rounds out the Panther starting five—all returners from the 2020-21 campaign.
 
Five other Sun Belt programs will also participate in the postseason—back-to-back Sun Belt regular-season champion Texas State in the National Invitation Tournament (NIT); App State, Coastal Carolina and South Alabama in The Basketball Classic (TBC, formerly the CIT); and Troy in the College Basketball Invitational (CBI).