March Madness: Sun Belt Tournament Seeds Announced

The 2013 Sun Belt Conference Tournament seedings and brackets were announced by the league office Saturday night and both the FIU men's and women's basketball teams have earned first-round byes as the No. 4 and No. 5 seeds, respectively.

The men will face the No. 5-seeded UALR Trojans (17-14, 11-0 SBC) on Saturday, March 9 at 7:00 p.m. ET. FIU finished the 2012-2013 regular season with a 16-13 record and an 11-9 SBC mark, earning the most conference victories since joining the league in 1998-1999. The 16 wins by the Panthers are the most for FIU in 13 years. The No. 4 seed is the highest for the Panthers since earning the No. 4 seed in the 2000 SBC Tournament.

The women will face the No. 4 seeded Arkansas State Red Wolves (15-14, 12-8 SBC) on Saturday, March 9 at 12:30 p.m. ET. FIU finished the 2012-2013 regular season with an 18-11 overall record and a 12-8 mark in SBC action. The Panthers won five of their last seven games to earn the team's second first-round bye in the last three years. The Panthers are led by All-America candidate Jerica Coley, who leads the nation in scoring, averaging 26.1 points-per-game.

The first round games can be viewed exclusively on www.sunbeltsports.org as the Sun Belt Digital Network will webcast those games. The quarterfinal games taking place in Summit Arena will be aired on the Sun Belt Network, while the Convention Center Court quarterfinals will be shown on Sun Belt Digital Network. All four (both men's and women's) semifinal matchups will be aired on the Sun Belt Network.

The women's championship match will be broadcast nationally on ESPNU at 2 p.m. ET, while the men's championship match will be broadcast nationally on ESPN at 7 p.m. ET (the championship game was originally announced to air on ESPN2).

Tickets for the tournament are available through www.ticketmaster.com and the Summit Arena box office (501.620.5003)