Men's Basketball at No. 1 Randolph-Macon
NCAA Tournament Second Round | Ashland Regional
Saturday, March 5 | 7 p.m.
Crenshaw Gym | Ashland, Va.

SERIES HISTORY
• Babson and Randolph-Macon will meet for the first time on Saturday night.

BABSON IN THE NCAA TOURNAMENT
• The Beavers are making their sixth appearance since 2014 and are back in the NCAA Tournament for the 11th time in program history.
• Babson claimed the program's first national championship with a 79-78 win over Augustana (Ill.) in 2017. The Green and White also advanced to the Final Four in 2015 and reached the Sweet 16 in 2002 and 2016.
• The Beavers are 4-2 all-time in second round games, which includes victories in three straight between 2015-17.

RANDOLPH-MACON IN THE NCAA TOURNAMENT
• The Yellow Jackets are making the program's 18th NCAA Tournament appearance and third straight after advancing to the Sweet 16 in both 2019 and 2020.
• Randolph-Macon advanced to the Final Four for the first time in program history in 2010 and reached the national quarterfinals in 2015.

SCOUTING THE BEAVERS
• Babson (19-7) defeated DeSales, 80-67, on Friday night in the first round of the NCAA Tournament.
• Sophomore Kieran Dorney scored 19 points on 8-of-13 shooting, senior Colin Bradanese finished with 18 points, 10 rebounds and five assists, and first-year Nate Amado added 16 points for the Beavers, who shot a season-best 53.6 percent as a team.
• Bradanese (14.8 pts, 6.1 reb) is shooting 53 percent from the floor, Dorney (12.3 pts, 7.0 reb) leads the team with seven double-doubles, and Amado (11.6 pts, 7.5 reb) has scored at least 16 points in four of his last five outings.
• The Green and White has scored at least 77 points in seven of its last eight games and ranks 31st in Division III in three-point field goal defense holding its opponents to just 29.4 percent shooting.

SCOUTING THE YELLOW JACKETS
• No. 1 Randolph-Macon (28-1) extended its winning streak to 22 with a 99-57 rout of Mitchell in Friday's NCAA Tournament opener.
• Josh Talbert finished with 21 points on 9-of-12 shooting and eight assists, Buzz Anthony added 17 points and seven dimes, and Miles Mallory chipped in with 15 points, nine board and four assists for the Yellow Jackets, who shot 59.1 percent on the night.
• Anthony (17.9 pts, 7.3 ast, 4.2 reb) ranks third in Division III in assists, while Mallory (15.2 pts, 8.2 reb) and Talbert (12.5 pts, 4.6 ast, 3.6 reb) are both shooting 57.6 percent from the floor.
• Randolph-Macon ranks second in Division III in scoring defense allowing just 59.0 points and is ninth in field goal percentage at 49.4 percent.

BABSON VS. NO. 1
• Saturday's matchup with the Yellow Jackets marks the first time Babson will face the No. 1 ranked team in the country since March 2017, when it knocked off top-ranked Whitman 91-85 in the national semifinals in Salem, Va.

VETERAN DUO EARNS ALL-NEWMAC HONORS
• Bradanese and graduate student Mitchell Kirsch collected NEWMAC All-Conference honors on Tuesday.
• Bradanese, who ranks fifth in the league in field goal percentage, sixth in blocked shots, 10th in scoring and 12th in rebounding was named to the first team.
• Kirsch, who garnered second-team honors, is averaging 9.5 points, 4.6 assists, 4.3 rebounds and 1.4 steals and is the only player to start all 25 games this winter for the Beavers.

MOVING UP THE CHARTS
• Bradanese blocked three shots on Friday night against DeSales and passed Tim O'Brien '97 for second place on the program's all-time list with 80 career blocks. He now trails only Babson's all-time leader Bryant Richards '96, who swatted 128 shots in his career.
• Kirsch, who transferred from Claremont-Mudd-Scripps, has dished out 121 assists this season, which is tied for the third highest total going back to 2003. He is tied for 10th on the program's single-season list.
• Kirsch's father David, a 1986 graduate of Babson, dished out 317 assists during his four-year career and ranks sixth on the program's career list.

COMING ON STRONG
• Over his final 10 games prior to the NCAA Tournament, Dorney is averaging 15.5 points and 9.1 rebounds while scoring in double figures nine times and posting five double-doubles.
• He is shooting 50 percent (31-of-62) from beyond the arc and has made at least three triples in eight of 10 contests during this stretch.

SWEET VIRGINIA
• The state of Virginia will always hold a special place in the history of Babson men's basketball thanks to the Beavers' 2017 national championship run that culminated with rallying from a 25-point deficit against Whitman in the national semifinals prior to the title game victory over Augustana (Ill.)
• Friday's contest marks the first time Babson has returned to Virginia since hoisting the Walnut and Bronze on March 18, 2017.
• Head coach Stephen Brennan was selected as the NABC Coach of the Year in the days following the national title and current assistant Matthew Droney '17 came off the bench to score eight points in the championship game.

THREE AT A TIME
• Since entering the starting lineup at Springfield on February 9, senior James Welch is averaging 15.8 points on 51.2 percent shooting.
• He is 17-of-30 (56.7 percent) from beyond the arc, has made at least three three-pointers in each of his last four outings and has knocked down 105 career triples.

TOURNAMENT TESTED
• Bradanese, who finished with 13 points and nine rebounds, and junior Andrew Kirkpatrick (11 points, 4-of-9 FG) both started in the Beavers' 90-88 OT loss to Ithaca in the first round of the 2020 NCAA Tournament.
• Junior Aaron Gao came off the bench to score eight points on 4-of-5 shooting in 14 minutes of action, while senior Beau Smith grabbed one board in six minutes in his NCAA Tournament debut.

NUMBERS TO KNOW
• The Beavers are 10-1 this season when holding opponents below 40 percent shooting and 10-0 when foes score less than 70 points.
• Babson has gone 10-0 when scoring at least 80 points this winter.
• The Beavers are 14-1 when outrebounding their opponents.
• The Green and White is 10-0 when making at least nine three-pointers.

LOOKING AHEAD
• The winner of Saturday's contest will take on either Nazareth or UMass Dartmouth in the sectional semifinals next Friday.