This week: Notre Dame College men's basketball opens the 2019-20 season at the Conference Challenge hosted by Fairmont State University. They will tipoff against Slippery Rock University at 8 p.m., on November 8. The next day, NDC will play Millersville University, beginning at 4 p.m.

Records: Notre Dame held a record of 23-9 (16-6 MEC) in 2018-19. They won their first Mountain East Conference Tournament Championship in program history. Slippery Rock finished last season at 19-10, overall, and 16-5 in the PSAC. Millersville finished 2018-19 with a record of 16-13, while going 11-9 in the PSAC East Division. Both Millersville and SRU lost in the first round of the PSAC Tournament.

Coaches Corner: Mark Richmond enters his first season as the head coach of NDC. Ian Grady is in his second season as head coach of SRU, putting together a 19-10 record last season. Casey Stitzel enters his fourth campaign as head coach of Millersville. He has a record of 35-49.

Rankings: Slippery Rock received one vote in the preseason NABC poll.

Series History: The Falcons beat Slippery Rock last season, in their first ever matchup, when Will Vorhees hit the game-winner with three seconds remaining. NDC fell to Millersville in their only matchup, two seasons ago.

Noting the Falcons: Last season, Notre Dame won 20 regular season games for the first time in program history and they finished the conference tournament with 16 MEC wins on the year, which was the most in program history. NDC defeated West Virginia State, Fairmont State and West Liberty to clinch their first MEC Tournament Championship and first bid to the NCAA Division II Tournament. But, a lot has changed since last season. Notre Dame hired Mark Richmond on July 9. Richmond is coming from Youngstown State University where he was the men's basketball director of operations for two seasons. The noticeable missing piece on the floor will be last year's MEC and Division II Player of the Year, Will Vorhees, who graduated. This season, Falcons were tabbed to finish in fourth place, in a tie with West Virginia State, in the MEC Preseason Poll. With 19 players on the roster this season, 12 are new faces. However, the team will rely on many returners, including Larenz Thurman and Bruce Hodges III who will still be major pieces in the backcourt. Thurman earned a spot on the First Team All-MEC after averaging 16.9 points on 47-percent shooting along with 4.9 assists per game. Hodges was named to the All-MEC Tournament Team for his play to help clinch, including his season-high of 22 points in the MEC Championship game. Drew Scarberry returns for his senior season and has been a consistent presence for NDC, playing in all 89 games over his first three seasons. He is third in NDC history, shooting 41-percent from three point land in his career. Levi Frankland redshirted last season with an injury, but averaged 8.8 points on 42-percent shooting in 2017-18.
 
Noting the Rock: Slippery Rock put together 16 conference wins last season for the first time since the 2012-13 campaign. In the 2012-13 season, the Rock went to the NCAA Division II Tournament, but in 2018-19, they did not earn a bid after losing to Mercyhurst in the First Round of the PSAC Tournament. This season, Slippery Rock was picked to finish second in the PSAC West Preseason Poll. SRU does bring back Micah Till, who led the team in scoring average (21), rebounds per game (10), field goal percentage (51%) and blocks (45). Jared Armstrong is also returning, after averaging 16.3 points per game off the bench. He led the team in total points with 477 and three point percentage at 43-percent. Till has earned a spot on the All-PSAC First Team in each of the past two seasons and has been named to an All-Region team over the past three years. Armstrong earned a spot on Second Team All-PSAC last season.

Noting the Marauders: Millersville won 16 games last year, for the first time since the 2014-15 season. This season, they have a very young team with 10 underclassmen and no seniors. Despite that, MU was picked to finish fourth in the PSAC Eastern Division. Last season, Jaden Faulkner earned Second Team All-PSAC after averaging 14.3 points on 52-percent shooting, 5.3 rebounds per game, 4.9 assists per game and 2.2 steals per game as a freshman. He returns in 2019-20. Caden Najdawi, Justin Nwosu and James Sullivan are three players who started 28 games last year and return this season. Najdawi averaged 12 points per game and led the team with 37 blocks. He also grabbed 7.7 rebounds per game. Nwosu scored 11 points per game on 50-percent shooting.