Making the Championship Turn

The Big South Conference awards 18 championships (17 of which involve tournaments or meets to determine a winner, with football being settled only on a regular season basis).

At this point in the year, half of those titles have been earned, with half to go.

The most recent of these, of course, is the 2010 Men's Basketball Championship won by Winthrop on Saturday. It was an intense, exciting game--not one with great shooting, but one won with dogged defense and determination by the Eagles. Doing so against Coastal on the Chanticleers' home court was nothing short of a sweet bonus for the WU faithful in this clash of longtime rivals.

So, at this midpoint, how has the title allotment gone so far?

By sport (and chronologically):
Men's Cross Country -- Liberty
Women's Cross Country -- Liberty
Women's Soccer -- High Point
Men's Soccer -- Winthrop
Volleyball -- Coastal Carolina
Football -- Liberty / Stony Brook (tie)
Men's Indoor Track -- Liberty
Women's Indoor Track -- Liberty
Men's Basketball -- Winthrop

By school:
Liberty -- 4.5
Winthrop -- 2
High Point -- 1
Coastal -- 1
(Stony Brook, associate member -- 0.5)

In short, half of the titles have been won--and half of those belong to the Flames, thanks mainly to the strength of the student-athletes in the running sports and related field events. Liberty has the men's/women's double in cross country and indoor track...and they'll be aiming for outdoor track next month.

Meanwhile, LU will also contend for the women's basketball crown, to be awarded this upcoming weekend...but the Flames know their dominance in this sport has a clear challenger in the form of Gardner-Webb. The Lady Bulldogs won the Big South Regular Season Championship for women's hoops, and they want to follow with a tourney title and NCAA berth.

There will be some interesting stories to follow in this week's Advance Auto Parts Big South Women's Basketball Championship from High Point. We encourage you to keep up with the events through all the Big South online outlets...but for now, this is SHOUT--out...