JOHNSON CITY, Tenn. (July 7, 2008) - A season-opening tournament sponsored by ESPN, matchups with former Southern Conference rivals Appalachian State and Chattanooga, trips to Conference USA opponent Marshall and Missouri Valley Conference foe Bradley, and a 20-game Atlantic Sun Conference slate highlight the 2008-09 ETSU men's basketball schedule announced Monday by head coach Murry Bartow.

            "We have a challenging schedule again this year, no doubt," said Bartow, whose team will also enjoy a three-day preseason exhibition trip to Canada over the Labor Day weekend in September. "The Canada trip will be an exciting part of our season because it will give us a head start on the year and it will give us a glimpse at our team. As usual, the pre-conference schedule will be tough, especially with so many road games early, but the Charleston tournament is a good field and an ESPN event, so that should be exciting for our players and our fans."

            The Buccaneers will host two exhibition games to get the year started in early November before playing eight of their first nine regular season contests on the road. The season will begin at the eight-team ESPN tournament hosted by College of Charleston, with Clemson, Temple, Texas Christian, Western Michigan, North Texas, ETSU and Charleston listed as seven of the eight teams confirmed to participate.

            ETSU will return home to face Wingate in the regular season home opener on Nov. 20, before heading out for five straight on the road against Tennessee Tech (Nov. 24), Bradley (Nov. 29), Marshall (Dec. 2), Mercer (Dec. 5) and Appalachian State (Dec. 13). The Bucs will return home to take on in-state rival Chattanooga on Dec. 17 before rounding out their early season schedule with a trip to Kennesaw State on Dec. 23 and a home match up with Morehead State on Dec. 30.

            While the team will play Mercer and Kennesaw State to open conference play in December, the full league slate picks up as usual in January. ETSU will open with a home stand against Jacksonville and North Florida, with an important four-game home stretch following later in the month as Lipscomb (Jan. 17), Belmont (Jan. 19), Campbell (Jan. 22) and USC Upstate (Jan. 26) visit Memorial Center. Other highly anticipated A-Sun games on the schedule include a trip to Jacksonville on Jan. 30 that will be televised regionally by CSS, and the Nashville swing to Belmont (Feb. 14) and Lipscomb (Feb. 16). The Bucs other CSS telecast will be on Monday, Jan. 26 when they host USC Upstate.

For ticket information fans can visit ETSUBucs.com and click on the ticket link, or call 423-439-ETSU (3878).

 2008-09 Schedule

Saturday, Nov. 1.................................... Milligan (exhibition) 4 p.m.

Saturday, Nov. 8................................. Mars Hill (exhibition), 4 p.m.