With their victory over the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, the Georgia Southern University Eagles will face the Elon Phoenix in the quarterfinals of the 2012 Men's Basketball Southern Conference Tournament.

The Phoenix has faced the Eagles once this season, dropping a 69-63 decision to Georgia Southern Jan. 5 in Alumni Gym.

Elon was in the midst of a five-game losing streak after starting the season 7-2. Georgia Southern won their third-straight conference game. Eagles' sophomore forward Eric Ferguson had 21 points and 14 rebounds, redshirt senior guard Willie Powers III had 16 points and senior guard Ben Drayton III had 17 points and four assists.

The Phoenix fell to its common enemy: the scoring drought. Elon did not make a field goal for 7:46 in the second half and let its 14-point lead slip away. The Eagles also applied a lot of defensive pressure. Elon head coach Matt Matheny's squad made just 36 percent of their shots and allowed Georgia Southern to shoot 59.3 percent in the second half to climb back into the game and win.

The Phoenix has seen their 7-6 record at that time jump to 14-15, while Georgia Southern's 14-14 record presents an improvement. But as has been said in this blog before, it is hard to see what's going to happen. It is near impossible to predict how this Phoenix team is going to present itself. I wrote last time, "If I have to be completely honest though, it is clear anything can happen in the SoCon."

Georgia Southern, in the one game I've seen them, presented something that most teams don't have: Eric Ferguson. The young sophomore is basically a combination of Elon sophomores guard Jack Isenbarger and forward Lucas Troutman; Ferguson can shoot (56 percent from the field), score (14.8 points per game), rebound (7.1 rebounds per game) and basically just be intimidating. He posterized poor Elon freshman guard Austin Hamilton in the one matchup this year. Ferguson had 26 points (on 9-13 shooting) and eight rebounds Friday night against Chattanooga.

If I can be completely honest, Elon has a legitimate shot. If they can contain Ferguson, Powers III and Drayton can be somewhat handled by Isenbarger, Hamilton and Spradlin. Another guy to key on is Eagles guard Jelani Hewitt, who had 15 points and nine rebounds against the Mocs. It comes down to defense, something Matheny said was lacking last time against the Eagles.

If the Phoenix can play lights out the way they did against North Division champ UNCG Feb. 25, I can definitely see Elon advancing to the final four of the SoCon.

But that's always a big if with this program, because there's always an unknown.

PROBABLE STARTING LINEUPS

GSU: Sr. G Ben Drayton (12.0 ppg, 2.1 rpg), So. G Eric Ferguson (14.8 ppg, 7.1 rpg), So. G Jelani Hewitt (10.7 ppg, 3.4 rpg), Sr. G Willie Powers III (11.1 ppg, 4.1 rpg, 5.4 apg), Jr. F Cameron Baskerville (4.0 ppg, 2.4 rpg)

ELON: Sr. G Drew Spradlin (9.4 ppg, 3.8 rpg), So. G Jack Isenbarger (14.1 ppg, 3.6 rpg), So. G Sebastian Koch (9.2 ppg, 5.3 rpg), So. F Ryley Beaumont (7.0 ppg, 5.7 rpg), So. F Lucas Troutman (12.7 ppg, 5.5 rpg)