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READING, Pa. – The Albright women's basketball team begins its journey in the NCAA Tournament in Greensboro, N.C., on Friday night when it faces Piedmont (Ga.) in a first round game. Tip-off is scheduled for 5:30 p.m. The winner of Friday's game will face the winner of the other game in the pod between Marymount (Va.) and the host, Guilford, on Saturday night at 7 p.m.

The Lions enter the 2017 tournament with plenty of experience returning from last season's run to the Sweet 16. Four players that started in that Sweet 16 game are expected to be in the Lions' starting lineup on Friday night. The lone senior of that group is Shannon Thomas. So far this season, she has reached the 1,000-point mark for her career and has set the school record for three pointers in a game with eight. She is an All-MAC Commonwealth Honorable Mention.

Alysha Lofton, Nina Mazzarelli and Jane Joyce are the other three returning starters from last year's tournament run, and all three were also named All-MAC Commonwealth. Lofton earned First Team honors and is averaging nearly a double-double with 12.3 points and 9.7 rebounds per game. Mazzarelli and Joyce each earned Second Team honors. Mazzarelli is one of the top three-point shooters in the MAC Commonwealth, making 36.5 percent of her shots. Joyce is the conference leader in assists, averaging 3.6 per game. She is also fifth in the league in steals.

Janice Luck earned her third consecutive MAC Commonwealth Coach of the Year award and fourth overall after leading the team to a perfect 16-0 regular season in league play. The Lions advanced to the conference title game for the third straight year before dropping a 53-50 decision to Messiah. Albright hasn't lost consecutive games in more than two years. It lost back-to-back conference road games at Lebanon Valley and Stevenson in late January/early February 2015.

Albright is in the top-10 percent of NCAA Division III in field-goal percentage (42.7 percent), three-point field-goal percentage (34.5 percent), free-throw percentage (74 percent) and blocked shots (4.6 per game).

Piedmont enters with a 21-7 record after winning the USA South Tournament title over the weekend. Piedmont attempts – and makes – a lot of three pointers. It is 20^th in the country in three-point attempts and 16^th in makes from beyond the arc. Piedmont (also nicknamed the Lions) are 15^th in the nation in free throw attempts, but are only ranked 373^rd in free-throw percentage out of 434 teams in Division III.

Carlie Shields is 19^th in the country in assist-to-turnover ratio at 2.2-to-1. Brianna Barrett and Bridgette Kelly are two of the better three-point shooters in the USA South.