11/30/2011 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Nov. 30, 2011
VMI at Coastal Carolina
Thursday, Dec. 1 / 7:00 p.m.
Kimbel Arena / Conway, S.C.
Notes: Coastal Carolina Game Notes 
Radio: WJXY-FM 93.9 Myrtle Beach
CONWAY- The Coastal Carolina men's basketball team will open up Big South Conference play on Thursday, Dec. 1 when they host Virginia Military Institute with tip-off slated for 7:00 p.m. in Kimbel Arena. Coastal currently holds a 20-6 record in Big South Conference openers.
ABOUT VMI
VMI enters conference play with a 3-2 overall record, coming off a loss to Ohio State last Wednesday... Stan Okoye became the 36th player in VMI history to achieve 1,000 career points when he scored his first basket against OSU... The day after Coastal's Chris Gradnigo recorded ESPN's "Top Play" one of Okoye's dunks was also named the #1 "Top Play"... Keith Gabriel has scored over 20 points three times this season, ranking second in the Big South in scoring (19.6 ppg)... Last season's Big South Freshman of the Year D.J. Covington has not played in the last four games because of injury.
THE SERIES
Coastal Carolina holds a 14-5 overall record against VMI, including six straight in the last two seasons... Coastal's last loss to the Keydets came during the 2008-09 season when VMI won 96-76 at home... Coastal holds a 9-1 record in the series that dates back to the 2003-04 season.
BUZZ KILL
Four days after the Chanticleers defeated the Clemson Tigers on tip-in at the buzzer, Florida International broke a 63-all tie in the waning seconds compliments of a buzzer beating jump shot to hand the Chanticleers their first loss of the early season... Coastal led by seven in the second half and had a chance to take the lead in the last 10 seconds but an FIU stop led to the game-winning shot as time expired.
ALL OF THE BUZZ
Coastal defeated Clemson 60-59 on Tuesday night for the first time in six games against the Tigers... Gradnigo grabbed his own offensive rebound and tipped in a buzzer beating shot to send the Chants to 5-0 on the year... The Chanticleers trailed by 12 points late in the first half but went on a 16-5 run over the next 7:39 to pull within one point at the 14:36 mark of the second half... Coastal took its largest lead of the night at the 8:47 mark on a pair of free throws by Kierre Greenwood... Clemson rallied and built a four-point lead on a 3-pointer by Tanner Smith with 1:46 remaining but Coastal held the Tigers without a basket the rest of the game, giving Clemson its second loss of the year.
TAMING THE TIGERS
Coastal improves to 2-0 against BCS schools this year, both of which mascots are the Tigers. This is the first time that the Chants have defeated two schools from BCS conferences during the same season in school history.
DOUBLE TIME
Junior guard Anthony Raffa has recorded double-figures in points in each of his last 15 games, dating back to Feb. 12 of last season... Raffa is currently leading the Chanticleers in scoring, averaging 17 points per game... Raffa was the top returning scoring with 11.7 points per game last year... He currently leads the Big South in steals (2.5 spg) while his 17 ppg points ranks fourth in the BSC.
