The 2023 South Atlantic Conference Tournament is one like no other as it is the first time it features divisional seeding. Tusculum earned the No. 2 seed from the Mountain Division while the Bears are the No. 3 seed in the Piedmont Division.

Each team enters with an 11-7 mark in conference play but the Bears will head to Tusculum for the second time this season. In the regular season, LR handed the Pioneers a 73-66 defeat which snapped a 10-game losing streak to Tusculum. Blaikley Crooks led the Bears with 22 and Emily Harman added 19 as the Bears led wire-to-wire for the victory. The Bears scored the first 12 points of the game and never looked back as they finished the first quarter with a 23-5 lead.

At 21-7, the Bears have their first 20-win season since winning 24 during the 2013-14 season that also saw them share a SAC Regular Season crown. This is also just the ninth 20-win season in program history and just the fourth in the NCAA Era.

The Pioneers may be fighting for their postseason fate on Wednesday. The Pioneers were ranked No. 9 in the region in last week's NCAA Southeast Regional poll with just eight teams getting in. Since those rankings were released, Tusculum lost to Anderson and Catawba by double digits on the road. The Bears were number four in that poll but also dropped a pair of road games at Carson-Newman and UVA Wise by identical 80-77 scores.
Tusculum is 11-3 at home on the season and averages 76.4 points per game in their own gym as compared to just 65.0 points per game away from home.

Each team has had long winning streaks on the year. Tusculum won 11 straight from November 18-December 31 while the Bears won the first 14 games of the year.

In South Atlantic Conference history, the Bears have captured just two SAC Tournament titles. LR took the crown in 2003 and won again in 2009. Lenoir-Rhyne is just 15-29 in 31 all-time SAC tournament appearances and have earned just two wins since 2015.

This will be just the fourth time LR and Tusculum meet in the SAC Tournament with Tusculum winning two of the first three. The two last met in 2013 where the Pioneers won 59-51 in overtime in the semifinals. LR's only win in the tournament against Tusculum came in the 2009 championship game by a final score of 66-57.

The winner will move on to Furman and play the winner of Catawba and Limestone on Saturday at 4:30 p.m.