CLEVELAND, OH – Denison (14-2) caps the 2024-25 North Coast Athletic Conference regular season with the program’s first NCAC men’s basketball championship title.
Wooster leads all NCAC men's teams with 19 titles overall, while Wittenberg is second all-time with 13 total titles, followed by Ohio Wesleyan with seven, Allegheny with four, Wabash with two and Denison with one.
As league champions, the Big Red have earned the top seed and hosting rights for the 2025 NCAC men’s basketball final four. The seeding for the tournament follows the regular-season standings with the top-six teams earning a berth into the postseason. The two-team tie between DePauw (9-7) and Ohio Wesleyan (9-7) for fourth and the three-way tie between Kenyon (5-11), Oberlin (5-11) and Wittenberg (5-11) for sixth were broken via the conference tiebreaker system for seeding purposes only.
In the quarterfinal matchups on Tuesday, February 25, No. 6 Oberlin travels to No. 3 Wooster (11-5), while No. 4 Ohio Wesleyan hosts No. 5 DePauw. Both games are set to tipoff at 7:00 p.m. During the regular season, the Fighting Scots earned two wins over the Yeomen, 92-80 on Nov. 30 and 83-59 on Jan. 25, while the Battling Bishops swept the Tigers, 89-85 on Jan. 22 and 73-71 on Feb. 19.
In the semifinal round on Friday, Feb. 28, in Granville, No. 2 Wabash (13-3) will take on the quarterfinal winner of Oberlin versus Wooster at 5:00 p.m., while top-seeded Denison will square off against the winner of the DePauw versus Ohio Wesleyan quarterfinal for a 7:30 p.m. showdown. The gym will be cleared between the first and second game and separate tickets will be required for each semifinal game.
The tournament final is set for 4:00 p.m. on Saturday at Denison University as the semifinal winners will compete for the tournament title and receive the NCAC’s automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament.
TOURNEY TALK: Second-seeded Wabash is the defending NCAC Tournament champion after defeating Wooster 75-64 in the 2024 tournament final to claim back-to-back-to-back titles. The Little Giants have qualified for the tournament every year it has been contested since joining the NCAC in the 1999-00 academic year … Third-seeded Wooster leads all teams with 17 tournament titles. Together, the Fighting Scots and Wittenberg (8) own 25-of-39 tournament crowns while Ohio Wesleyan (5), Allegheny (3), Wabash (3), Denison (1), DePauw (1), Kenyon (1) own the remaining 14 trophies (no tournament was conducted in 2021) … The Fighting Scots last won the tourney title in 2019 and are heading into the NCAC Tournament with the league’s highest winning percentage at .786 (81-22), followed by Wittenberg at .675 (54-26), Wabash at .533 (24-21) and Ohio Wesleyan at .514 (36-34) … Wooster has advanced to the tournament final a league-leading 30 times, while Wittenberg follows with 18; Ohio Wesleyan has 10 appearances in the tourney final, followed by Allegheny (8), Wabash (6), Kenyon (3), Denison (2) and DePauw (1) … Denison enters this year’s field as the top seed and will look to advance to the final for the first time since capturing the tourney title in 2016 … Ohio Wesleyan enters the tournament as the four seed and will look to advance to the semifinal round for the first time since 2018 … No. 5 DePauw, which won the tourney title in 2015, returns to the field for the eighth-straight year and the 12th time in the last 13 competitive seasons … Oberlin, the six seed, returns to the tournament for the third-consecutive season and is in search of the team’s first quarterfinal win since 2020.