At the end of the 2018-2019 NCAA basketball season, there are still 43 teams from the Never Made the Tournament club, a collection of teams that have, well, never made the men's NCAA basketball tournament. Two teams, however, graduated from this club this season, Abilene Christian University and Gardner-Web University. The Abilene Christian Wildcats' run ended at the hands of another pair of wildcats, Kentucky's, but the Gardner-Web running bulldogs have yet to play. They, as the sixteen seed, are matched up with the Virginia Cavaliers, the one seed in the south region. Historically, only one sixteen seed has ever beaten the one seed, which coincidentally happened last year with the UMBC Retrievers beating the Cavaliers. But, other than that one singular game, sixteen seeds have never had any luck with the one seed. So what makes the Running Bulldogs think they have much of a chance in their first ever NCAA tournament appearance?
They have a redshirt senior leading them. A man by the name of David Efianayi, possibly one of the greatest if not the greatest Running Bulldog to ever put on the uniform.
Playing at Ocoee High School in Orlando, Florida, Efianayi was never recruited very heavily, even though he was rated the 27th best player in Florida at the time. Receiving offers from North Florida, IPFW, UT-Martin and North Carolina Central, he instead chose to go to Gardner-Web, where he would redshirt as a freshman. He would play a bench roll in his first full season, scoring only 7.4ppg and grabbing 1.9rpg. That season was punctuated by a great showing at Toccoa Falls on November 19, where he would score a season high 17 points.
The next season would be where Efianayi really exploded onto the scene. During his sophomore season, he had 6 different games where he scored 20 or more points, with the best performance coming against Liberty University on February 9, where he would score a then career high 27 points. He also had an extremely impressive performance against Pittsburgh earlier in the season, scoring 20 points of the bench. Efianayi proved during this season that he could put the ball in the basket in a variety of ways. However, this didn't lead to postseason success. That would come this season, where he has been far and away the best player on this team.
This season Efianayi has started in every single game this year, all 32 for the Running Bulldogs. Not only did he bring his trademark scoring, a cool 18.4ppg, while also averaging just over 6 free throw attempts a game, showing his ability to score from the outside and the inside. Not only is the team's offensive stalwart, he also brings a tenacity to the defensive end that's recognized conference wide. He leads the entire team with an average of 1.3 steals a game. This level of play on both sides of the court lead to Efianayi being named to the second team All Big South conference, the second time in his career being named to an all conference team.
However, none of those accolades would be worth it in Efianayi's mind without postseason success, specially getting his college to their first even NCAA tournament appearance. They took the first step toward that with a stellar regular season, finishing first in the Big South and earning a one seed in the ensuing conference tournament. They would then proceed to run through the first and second rounds, ending up in the championship game against the two seed, Radford University. Again, the Running Bulldogs' biggest star shone again. Impacting the game in a myriad of ways, Mike Jones, called him, "One of the most explosive players I’ve ever competed against." As mentioned earlier in the article, Gardner-Web would end up winning the Big South conference tournament, punching their ticket to the "Big Dance."
The Running Bulldogs have a tall task ahead of them when they face the Virginia Cavaliers in the first round of the tournament, a team that many considered could be the number one overall seed at many points during the season. However, with Efianayi leading the charge, with his mix of tenacity on the defensive end and ability to score from all three levels, the team making their first NCAA tournament appearance can certainly give the Cavaliers a fight for 40 minutes.
Sources:
https://gwusports.com/roster.aspx?rp_id=6184
https://www.richmond.com/sports/college/schools/university-virginia/who-is-gardner-webb-coaches-who-know-the-bulldogs-break/article_215d01b9-9d30-59a1-a655-8c3116c3b909.html
https://www.midmajormadness.com/2019/3/18/18269819/never-made-the-tournament-club-2019-abilene-christian-gardner-webb-wac-summit-league
https://www.newsobserver.com/sports/article228062889.html
Cover image: GWUsports.com
All photos attributed to original owners
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