NCAA Basketball: 2018 Emerald Coast Classic preview and predictions

Baylor Bears (3-1)

Baylor is coming into this tournament 3-1 with convincing wins over Southern, Prairie View A&M and Nicholls State but they started the season with a bad loss to Texas Southern at home. Baylor has yet to play a game away from home so it will be interesting to see how they play good teams in a neutral site. They have responded well after the loss to Texas Southern by going on a three game winning streak, but they were heavy favorites and were expected to do as much. They will face some solid teams in this tournament and will need to play much better to be victorious.

They are led by Devonte Bandoo (14.5 ppg) and King McClure (14.3 ppg) in scoring and Mark Vital is their top rebounder (7.3 rpg). The Bears will need solid production from all these guys if they want to come out of this weekend successful and with some solid wins. Makai Mason also had 11 points in his Baylor debut in the win over Nicholls State and they will need the Yale transfer to play a key role in this game

Cincinnati Bearcats (3-1)

The Bearcats are another team that started the year out with a lose and have rattled off a three game win streak since. However, the Bearcats lose was to the Ohio State Buckeyes and they played a great defensive game but just could not string together enough offense to win the game.

Cincinnati is only giving up 57.5 points per game to their opponents this year, but they only have one player (Jarron Cumberland) averaging double-digit points with 18.3 points per game. They will need guys like Tre Scott, Nysier Brooks and Cane Broome if they want to leave Florida with a couple of wins that are much needed for their NCAA tournament resume.  They also are shooting just 27.8 percent from three-point range this season and they will have to bump that number up over the weekend.

Ole Miss Rebels (2-1)

Ole Miss has had an average year thus far, winning their first two games of this classic easily over Western Michigan and Nicholls State and losing to Butler in a close, back and forth match-up. The Rebels are in a tough SEC conference this year and will need to prove themselves in this tournament and show that they can compete with Kentucky, Tennessee and Auburn amongst others in the conference.

The Rebels are led by Terence Davis with 20.3 points per game and Breein Tyree with 13.7 points per game. Watch out for D.C Davis in this tournament, who is averaging 7.3 points per game on only 127 minutes per game and is shooting 71.4 percent from the field. He should get some more minutes this weekend and play a bigger role than normal.

George Mason Patriots (2-3)

The Patriots had a tough start to the season going 0-3 with all losses by single digits, but turned it around winning their last two games. They will no doubt be the underdog in the top half of the bracket as the have losses to Penn, American and Georgia Southern.

They are led in scoring by Justin Kier (12.2 ppg), Jaire Grayer (12 ppg) and Jarred Reuter (11.8 ppg). They have some consistent production from these three guys, but they need one of them to really step up and take the game over and become their go to scorer if they want to compete with these other three teams this weekend.