Location: Radford, VA
Distance from Farmville: 150 miles, 2 hours 25 minutes
Established: 1910
Students: 8,900
Type: Public
Nickname: Highlanders
Big South Member Since: 1983
Athletics Website:  http://www.ruhighlanders.com/
Fan Website: http://ruhoops.proboards.com/index.cgi

We’ve profiled all of the Big South schools south of Virginia, so today we turn to the home state. Out of the three other Big South schools in Virginia, Radford is the farthest away. Radford is also the only Big South school in Virginia who is a charter member of the conference. When it was announced a couple weeks ago that Longwood would joining the Big South the LancersBlog community voted that the Highlanders would be the Lancers’ top rival in the Big South Conference. Radford sponsor 19 NCAA sports but has yet to find sustained success in the Big South. The Highlanders have won two men’s basketball titles (’98, ’09), three men’s tennis titles (’07-09), and a softball championship in 2009. The men’s soccer team has also had some success, winning the Big South four times and going to the NCAA tournament six times. The Highlanders’ most famous athletic alumni is Virginia Tech football coach Frank Beamer.

Facilities

Dedmon Center: The 3,200 seat arena was built in 1981. It still has wooden bleachers on the visitors side, so bring a seat cushion Lancers fans.

Cupp Stadium: Built in 2003 the 5,000 seat stadium is one of the Big South’s finest.

Baseball/Softball Stadiums: Pretty standard facilities for both. The baseball stadium holds 700 people.

History with Longwood

For being so close the two schools actually haven’t met too often since the Lancers’ D1 transition. In basketball Radford visited for the home opener in 2004 and had a ten point win. The last time the two met in baseball was in 2010, a 9-6 win for the Lancers. Longwood owns the all-time baseball series lead at 11-7. In softball the both teams have split double-headers over the past two years. This season the men’s soccer team beat Radford, while the women’s team fell to the Highlanders. The two schools share membership in the NorPac Field Hockey Conference, where LU defeated Radford 3-1 on the road this year.