Men's Basketball Southern Conference

Paladins To Participate In Great Alaska Shootout

GREENVILLE, S.C. -- The Furman University Paladins basketball team will play in the 2004 Carrs/Safeway Great Alaska Shootout, head coach Larry Davis has announced.

Scheduled for Nov. 24-27 at Anchorage's Sullivan Arena, the 27th annual showcase, in addition to Furman, will feature Alabama, Alaska-Anchorage, High Point, Minnesota, Oklahoma, Utah, and Washington.

"The Great Alaska Shootout is one of the most prestigious preseason tournaments in college basketball, so it's a tremendous honor to receive an invitation," said Davis on Monday. "Our participation in this tournament, along with regular season games against Virginia, Auburn, and Indiana, will certainly make our schedule probably the toughest any Furman basketball team has faced in 25 years."

Furman will play three games in the tournament, whose pairings won't be released until later this summer. Purdue won last year's event, which was televised by ESPN's family of networks for the 19th straight year.

The Paladins' complete 2004-05 schedule should be released in late July, according to Davis.

Furman posted a 17-12 record a year ago and produced the Southern Conference's Freshman-of-the-Year in forward Quan Prowell (9.9 ppg/4.4 rpg). In addition, the Paladins dominated the league's all-freshman team in 2004-05, with guard Robby Bostain (10.2 ppg/4.1 rpg) and center Moussa Diagne (8.3 ppg/4.5 rpg) joining Prowell in securing three slots on the five-man squad. A fourth Paladin freshman, guard Eric Webb (9.6 ppg), finished fourth among league freshman in scoring a year ago and tallied a season high 28 points in a 94-84 SoCon Tournament quarterfinal round loss to eventual champion East Tennessee State.