\n
\n Story Links
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
HICKORY, N.C. – Head coach Brent Owen<\/a> and the Lenoir-Rhyne men’s basketball team have been selected to finish first in the South Atlantic Conference Preseason Coaches Poll.<\/p>\n Lincoln Memorial, Catawba, Tusculum, and Carson-Newman rounded out the top-five teams. Lincoln Memorial tied the Bears with five first-place votes.<\/p>\n Lenoir-Rhyne has become a SAC and Southeast Region power in the past two years, going 50-15, winning the 2025-26 SAC and Southeast Region Championship, winning five total NCAA postseason games, producing six All-SAC players and two SAC Newcomers of the Year.<\/p>\n The Bears have a strong mix of returners and newcomers, with Deuce Benjamin<\/a> and Jaylen Subject<\/a> being listed as SAC Preseason Players to Watch.\u00a0<\/p>\n Coach Owen and his squad open the season at home on Monday, November 9th, when they host Young Harris in Shuford Arena at 6:00 p.m. The Bears and Mountain Lions met last season in the NCAA Second Round, a game that saw the Bears win 84-78 to advance to the program’s third ever Southeast Region Championship game.<\/p>\n 2026-27 SOUTH ATLANTIC CONFERENCE MEN’S BASKETBALL PRESEASON COACHES’ POLL 2026-27 SAC Men’s Basketball Players to Watch
\n1. Lenoir-Rhyne – 115 points (5 first-place votes)
\n2. Lincoln Memorial – 111 points (5 first-place votes)
\n3. Catawba – 103 points (1 first-place vote)
\nT4. Tusculum – 80 points (1 first-place vote)
\nT4. Carson-Newman – 80 points
\n6. Wingate – 74 points
\n7. UVA Wise – 56 points
\n8. Emory & Henry – 44 points
\n9. Newberry – 41 points
\n10. Coker – 36 points
\n11. Mars Hill – 34 points
\n12. Anderson – 18 points
\n<\/p>\n
\nAnderson: Kendall Davis, Kory Davis
\nCarson-Newman: Matt Bilbrey, Sean Lindsay
\nCatawba: Carson Daniel, Chase Daniel
\nCoker: Khalil Green, Kenney Rogers
\nEmory & Henry: Melchior Hughes, Isaac Hymes
\nLenoir-Rhyne: Deuce Benjamin<\/a>, Jaylen Subject<\/a>
\nLincoln Memorial: Kam Roberts, Trey Horton III
\nMars Hill: Keenan Wilkins, Ashton Troutman
\nNewberry: Mary Kate Grant, Sanae Graham
\nTusculum: Jordan Attia, Amari Allen
\nUVA Wise: Cy Hardy, Anderson Cummins
\nWingate: Jordan Miller, Chase McKey<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Story Links
HICKORY, N.C. – Head coach Brent Owen and the Lenoir-Rhyne men’s basketball…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":946636,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[574],"tags":[64,63,726,85],"class_list":["post-946635","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-basketball","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-basketball","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/946635","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=946635"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/946635\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/946636"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=946635"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=946635"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=946635"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}