The UMBC men's basketball team's first NCAA Tournament appearance in a decade will pit the Retrievers against the field's top seed.
As the first No. 16 seed revealed Sunday night, UMBC will face No. 1 Virginia (31-2), which won the Atlantic Coast Conference regular-season and tournament titles, on Friday in the South Region in Charlotte, N.C. Tipoff times will be revealed later.
The America East Conference champion Retrievers punched their ticket to the Big Dance on Saturday on a last-second 3-pointer by guard Jairus Lyles that took down top-seeded Vermont in Burlington.
The win matched a program record for wins in a single season. The last UMBC team to win 24 games also made the program's last NCAA Tournament, which as a No. 15 seed lost in the opening round to No. 2 Georgetown, 66-47.
Villanova, Kansas and Xavier are the other top seeds. The first four games in Dayton, Ohio, will be LIU-Brooklyn against Radford and St. Bonaventure against UCLA on Tuesday night, and North Carolina Central against Texas Southern and Arizona State against Syracuse on Wednesday night.
