Greenville, N.C. --- East Carolina will make its season debut Wednesday afternoon by participating in the BCA Invitational in Raleigh. The Pirates will open the tournament at the RBC Center against West Coast Conference member Pepperdine at 12 p.m., and then meet the winner/loser of the game between Oregon State and Siena on Thursday. The winners will meet Thursday at 9 p.m., while the loser's bracket game is scheduled for 12 p.m. Each team is also guaranteed a game Friday.

ECU finished the 2003-04 strong, winning four of its final five regular season games before falling to Louisville in the Conference USA Tournament. The Pirates return just four letterwinners from last season's squad, but All-Conference USA candidates Moussa Badiane and Mike Cook make up half of that group.

With Badiane having to sit out Thursday's season opener against Pepperdine due to an NCAA-mandated one-game suspension, ECU will look to Cook and junior Corey Rouse to lead the way. Cook, an all-conference freshman team performer last season, is the Pirates' leading returning scorer (10.4 ppg), while Rouse is the only other player to be in the program for more than two years besides Badiane.

The Pirates will have just eight scholarship players available for duty Wednesday. In addition to Badiane's suspension, freshman Charles Bronson will be withheld in order to concentrate on academics. ECU's roster on Wednesday will one consist of two juniors, two sophomores and four freshmen that are currently on scholarship with two additional walk-ons.

Pepperdine returns 12 letterwinners, including all five starters, led by all-conference forwards Yakhouba Diawara and Glen McGowan. Diawara is the team's top returning scorer after averaging 18.9 points and 6.6 rebounds per game. McGowan was the squad's second leading returning scorer as he averaged just over 17 points per contest (17.8). The Waves averaged over 78 points per game last season and topped 90 seven times.

Wednesday's Winner Gets Oregon State or Siena
The path to the championship game for Wednesday afternoon's ECU-Pepperdine winner will go through either Oregon State or Siena. The Beavers and Saints will play Wednesday afternoon following the Pirates and Waves at approximately 2 p.m.

Games on the other side of the bracket Wednesday include NC State against New Orleans and Elon facing Fairleigh Dickinson. The Wolfpack and Privateers will open the night session at 7 p.m. ,p>The BCA Invitational semifinals will begin Thursday night at 7 p.m. with the championship game slated for Friday at 7:30. Loser bracket games will begin Thursday at noon. All eight teams are guaranteed three games each in the tournament.

Pirates Making Second Appearance In BCA Invitational
East Carolina participated in the inaugural BCA Invitational in 2001, which was also played at the RBC Center, and finished runner-up to North Carolina State, losing to the Wolfpack in the championship game.

The Pirates earned a spot in the title game by draining a school record 16 three-pointers against Northwestern in the semifinals. Brandon Hawkins made six threes as the Pirates out lasted the Wildcats, 71-68, and recorded their first-ever win over a Big 10 Conference opponent. ECU began the tournament with a 79-74 victory over Rutgers behind 23 points from Jonathan Moore and 17 from Erroyl Bing.

Experimental Rules in Play
Experimental rules will be used throughout the BCA Invitational. There will be three experimental rules in place for those games: 1) The three-point line will be moved back nines inches from its current position to create a distance of 20-feet, six inches; 2) Widening the free throw lane by one and one-half feet on each side; 3) Placing a restricted area arc which is two feet from the center of the basket ring.