Richmond, coming to Cintas Center today to meet Xavier for the first time, fancies itself as the Musketeers circa 1996: an established program stepping up from a mid-major league, seeking further credibility.

        For two decades, Richmond has been a celebrated Cinderella. The Spiders went 6-6 in the NCAA Tournament, becoming the first school to win games as a No.15, 14, 13 and 12 seed. They reached the Sweet 16 in 1998.

        Now they're the newest member of the Atlantic 10, taking a 7-7 mark (1-0 A-10) against the 10-3 Musketeers (2-0 A-10).

        Long-term, Richmond aims to put the David-with-a-slingshot act in mothballs.

        “It's not bad to be called giant-killers, but we hope to move away from that tag,” Richmond athletic director Jim Miller told the Enquirer last season.

        Richmond is a 2,900-student private school lauded for its academics. Princeton Review's 2002 edition rated Richmond the No.1 school in the nation in the best-quality-of-life category. The move to a bigger conference is part of the university's 10-year plan to raise its visibility nationally, Miller said.

        “Hopefully we can become a team that is thought of like the Xaviers and Gonzagas and Saint Joseph's,” coach John Beilein said. “Yeah, they're small schools, but they're tremendous basketball programs. No, they don't have all the resources that Ohio State, Syracuse, Maryland or Virginia have, but they still have a brand of basketball that they can play with anyone. That's our goal.”

        XU won five NCAA Tournament games from 1987-93, then left the mid-major Midwestern Collegiate Conference for the higher-profile A-10 in the 1995-96 season.

        Beilein sees a parallel between the two schools' transitional seasons.

        His veteran team last season went 22-7 and dominated the Colonial Athletic Association, though with a No.43 RPI (one spot better than XU had), it was left out of the NCAA field. Now he has just two returning starters and has lost top post player Eric Zwayer, who has bone spurs in his foot.

        In '95-96, then-XU coach Skip Prosser had just one returning starter — sophomore T.J. Johnson — and started four first-year players: freshmen Darnell Williams, Lenny Brown and Gary Lumpkin and junior-college transfer Kevin Carr. That team went 13-15 (8-8 A-10), the only season in the past 20 XU hasn't had a winning record.

        “If you look at Skip's team that year, it's similar,” Beilein said. “Next year all this will benefit, this experience we're gaining for players because we're down this year.”

        The Spiders have an intricate offense based on multiple passes and screens. XU coach Thad Matta describes it by saying, “They all play five different positions,” which is borne out by the fact that Richmond's second-tallest starter, 6- foot-7 senior Scott Ungerer, is a point guard.

        “It's a style that's fun to watch, we think,” Beilein said. “But we're moving into a physical, power-laden league. We hope to survive playing our finesse, passing, cutting game.”

        Richmond has a minus-9.1 rebounding average, but the Spiders average just 10.3 turnovers a game, third-fewest in Division I. They shoot just 37.6 percent, but that's up from the 34.8 percent mark they held after seven games. Reggie Brown (13.9 ppg) has averaged 22.7 points the past seven games.

        “We know they're a very capable team, and it's a tough style to adjust to,” Matta said.

Xavier Stories

Spiders want to take step up from Cinderella status Women: Xavier 68, Fordham 63

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