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Note: The following is a press release from Pfeiffer University.

After 304 days, Pfeiffer University is scheduled to restart athletic competition when the Falcons’ women’s basketball team travels to take on Brevard College in a nonconference game Sunday.  Tipoff from Brevard’s Boshamer Gymnasium is scheduled for 6 p.m.

“Our student-athletes are excited to begin our season and end the long drought of competition within our athletic department,” said Pfeiffer head women’s basketball coach Tooey Loy.

Pfeiffer will begin the season after finishing the 2019-20 campaign with a 12-13 overall record that included an 8-8 mark in USA South games.

Senior Brina Bentley (Chester, Va.) returns after earning USA South East Division Second Team honors a season ago.  Bentley averaged 15.0 points per game last season for the Falcons and scored a career-best 32 points in a 79-77 home win over Methodist on Feb. 8.  Bentley also earned USA South Player of the Week honors twice last season.

A’Mya McClain (Hickory, N.C.) also returns to anchor the backcourt in her senior season.  Last season, she also had an outstanding outing against Methodist, notching 26 points in the win, also a career-best.  She shot 46.5% from the field and a 38.5% clip from long-range last season and had 48 steals.

Bentley and McClain are also both within striking distance of scoring 1,000 career points.

Fellow senior Regan Allen (Olin, N.C.) also returns for the Falcons after shooting 27.8% from beyond the arc in 2019-20 as well as hitting 81.8% from the foul line.  Allen posted a career-high 11 points against Mary Baldwin on Feb. 9 and also had a career-best 14 rebounds at Toccoa Falls in December of 2019.

Allen and McClain are both equally as excited to usher in the season and to represent the Falcons’ return to play.

Allen said, “We feel a great sense of pride to be the first Pfeiffer team to reenter competition since the pandemic started last spring.”

McClain agreed and said, “We hope to make our coaches, fans, and the entire Pfeiffer community proud this upcoming season and continually thank everyone for all the support that has been given not only to us, but to all our athletic programs over the past several months.  We’re ready to get started!”

The last Pfeiffer team to see competition was the Falcon softball team, as they defeated FDU-Florham in a doubleheader by scores of 12-1 and 8-0, on March 12, 2020.

March 12 was the same day that the NCAA halted all winter and spring competitions, including championships across all three divisions, citing the “evolving COVID-19 public health threat”.

After following the developments of the pandemic through the summer, the USA South Presidents Council voted unanimously to postpone fall sports to the spring of 2021, and in late fall, also postponed the start of the league’s winter sports season to mid-January.

The makeup of the upcoming basketball season will differ greatly from the normal robust schedule.  Teams will participate in a double round-robin format within each division. Teams also have the opportunity, based on individual institutional guidelines, to schedule nonconference games.  In addition, the USA South announced that all indoor competitions, including basketball, will take place with no spectators.

Currently, the USA South plans to hold a championship tournament, with the top two teams from each division playing on March 3, with the winners advancing to the championship game on March 6.