CHICAGO – For the second consecutive season under head coach Steve McClain, the UIC Flames have been invited to play in the postseason and the squad will participate in the 10^th CollegeInsider.com Postseason Tournament (CIT).
 
UIC (17-15, 12-6 Horizon League) will host its first-round game, welcoming Saint Francis (PA) to the Windy City on Wednesday, March 14 at 7 p.m.
 
General admission seats in the lower bowl of the UIC Pavilion will be available for only $5 and floor seating is available for $20. Tickets will go on sale Monday, March 12 at 10 a.m. CT. To purchase in advance, please call the UIC Ticket Office at 312-413-UIC1 (8421) or visit UICFlames.com.
 
"Everyone in our program is honored and excited at the opportunity to extend our season," said UIC head coach Steve McClain. "To be able to go to the postseason two seasons in a row for the first time in 14 years is truly special and something our players worked hard to achieve. We're fortunate to be playing deep into March for the second year in a row and I think we all saw last year how these events can serve as a solid springboard into the next year."
 
The Flames are playing in the postseason in back-to-back years for the first time since the 2002-03 and 2003-04 seasons when the program went to the NIT and NCAA Tournament in consecutive campaigns. Coincidentally, the current group has helped win at least 17 games in back-to-back seasons for the first time since that era. This is the seventh time that UIC has accepted a postseason bid, and the second time playing in the CIT. The Flames went 1-1 in the 2013 CIT and the first-round win over Chicago State on March 20, 2013 was the first postseason win in program history.
 
Saint Francis, which plays in the Northeast Conference (NEC), finished the regular season with a record of 18-12. The Red Flash went 12-6 against NEC foes in the regular season, entering the conference tournament on a five-game winning streak, which was the program's longest since the 2010-11 season. SFU bowed out of the NEC Championship following an 85-74 loss to Fairleigh Dickinson on Feb. 28.
 
The Red Flash saw two players start all 30 games during the 2017-18 season in Jamaal King and Keith Braxton. King was the team's top scorer at 18.3 points per game, while Braxton poured in 17.4 ppg. Braxton nearly averaged a double-double with a team-best 9.7 rebounds per game.
 
The CollegeInsider.com Postseason Tournament is a single-elimination tournament consisting of five rounds. All games are played on campus sites, which will be determined by seeding. For the first time in tournament history, all 2018 CIT games will be televised on CBS Sports Network and CBS Digital.
 
The full bracket will be unveiled shortly.