TODAY:
Bubble people breathed a sigh of relief as Butler beat Milwaukee. Butler was one of three teams to earn a bid to the big dance. To no surprise, Oakland won the Summit League, but to everyone's surprise, Arkansas-Little Rock emerged victorious in the Sun Belt Championship (from nearby Hot Spring, Arkansas).
By winning, Ark-LR locked up their first trip to the tournament since 1990. That year, they earned a #16 seed, and were promptly eliminated by UNLV 102-72 (interesting note, UNLV went on to beat Duke in the title 103-73, so by ESPN's rationale, Duke was only 1 point better than Little Rock that year, right?) Expect a #16 seed this year again for the Trojans; they are the lowest ranked team to have locked up a bid thus far, although whoever wins the SWAC will be lower. They went 15-16 and 7-9 in the regular season.
Princeton won, forcing a one game playoff. This game will be saturday, not Friday as I originally reported. Leaning Harvard in that one.
Marquette and UCONN avoided disaster. Villanova did not. I mentioned them about a week ago (how they suck), and was upset that they were assigned "lock" status by Lunardi 9 weeks ago - otherwise they would be in trouble. Lets review their resume:
They are now 21-11, 9-10 in Big East with loss today. They've won two of their last nine games - those two were at Seton Hall, and at DePaul in OT. They did beat Cuse, WV, LVille, Cinci, UCLA, so, I guess Lunardi was right in assigning them lock status. They did practically lose every game, and are still going to get in.
Most of the other excitement came from the A-10. LaSalle beat St. Bonaventure in 2 OTs, St. Joes beat George Washington in OT, Rhode Island sneaked by St. Louis, and Dayton managed UMass. There is even more excitement on tap in Atlantic City tomorrow. Xavier faces Dayton, Duquesne takes on St. Joes, Temple vs LaSalle, and Richmond Rhode Island.
Which brings me to tomorrow. UConn takes on GTown in the morning, in the game I've dubbed the "why are either of these teams ranked" game. Shortly after that, we will see Nebraska taking on Oklahoma State at 930 AM PST. So, by the time I take a bite of my lunch, we may have one more team definitively out. (Kidding, I dont eat lunch, Im not a pussy). Colorado takes on Iowa State following that game, and they are in the same position as Nebraska.
The Pac10 tournament begins tomorrow, with the bottom four teams squaring off; Oregon v ASU, and Oregon State Stanford.
Marquette figures to be in regardless at this point, but beating WV would help.
The most open tournament in all the land is starting tomorrow as well, in the form of the C-USA. Check it out.
And there will be one more team celebrating a birth in the NCAA tourney. Things have come to fruition in Gealey, Colorado. #2 Montana will take on #1 Northern Colorado in the finals of the Big Sky tournament.
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