Two teams are now officially in the NCAA Tournament, and the championship games that produced then were all we could ask for. There will be some real debate about one of the winners in the week to come, in between what is sure to be more great championship games.
We start with the first of the two games, which was in the Mountain West Tournament. It’s not usually the first one, but it was this year and it certainly delivered if you were looking for a great game as Utah State and San Diego State matched up. The Aztecs won both regular season meetings during their 26-game winning streak to start the season, but the tournament is always different.
Utah State, meanwhile, may well have been fighting for their NCAA Tournament lives coming into and during the tournament. The Aggies had a fine non-conference showing that included wins over LSU and Florida, but in Mountain West play they lost convincingly at UNLV and Air Force (UNLV was improved) and also dropped one they should have had at Boise State. They had a couple of not-bad wins in non-conference as well over the likes of MEAC contender North Carolina A&T and Conference USA regular season champion North Texas, but neither moves the needle.
And as if that wasn’t enough, the Aggies trailed by 11 to New Mexico in the quarterfinals – a New Mexico team that fell apart once their two best players got in trouble off the court and were done for the season. The Lobos beat the Aggies by two in Albuquerque, but that might not hurt their case as much as the other losses. Utah State rallied to survive that one.
They had to rally again on Saturday, too, as they trailed by as many as 16 in the first half. They whittled it down to a two-point deficit at the half, The game was tied at 56 in the final seconds when Sam Merrill drilled a very deep three-pointer, and after a chess match of timeouts, Malachi Flynn got a reasonably good look from just past midcourt that rimmed out, giving the Aggies a 59-56 win and starting the debate as to whether or not they are bid thieves. We have a week to talk about that now, although any team that gets left out this year had more than ample opportunity to play their win in via wins.
From there, we go to Evansville, where the Ohio Valley Conference held its championship game in what has become one of the great rivalries in the sport. No. 1 Belmont and No. 2 Murray State hooked up in what figured to be another classic in this rivalry, which has included four previous meetings in the OVC championship game. It was a close one throughout, and while each team had leads of either seven or eight, most of the game was closer than that. It figured to come down to the end, and it didn’t disappoint.
After Murray State took a 75-74 lead on two Tevin Brown free throws with 11 seconds left, and a chess match of timeouts by both teams, Tyler Scanlon made a backdoor cut on the baseline, got the pass and converted a reverse layup with three seconds left. Murray State’s final attempt was blocked, and Belmont held on for a 76-75 win in another heart-stopping game between these two.
It was the end of a fine way to start the run of championship games, which will continue on Sunday with three more.
Side Dishes
Conference tournament roundup:
- Home teams ruled in the America East Tournament quarterfinals as No. 4 UMBC took care of No. 5 New Hampshire 73-67, No. 3 Hartford pulled away from No. 6 UMass-Lowell 89-75, No. 1 Vermont took care of No. 8 Maine 61-50 and No. 2 Stony Brook held off No. 7 Albany 76-73.
- In the semifinals of the Missouri Valley Conference Tournament, No. 4 Bradley beat No. 8 Drake 76-66 and No. 7 Valparaiso held off No. 6 Missouri State 89-82.
- The Northeast Conference Tournament had semifinal action, with both home teams getting double-digit wins. No. 2 Saint Francis U took care of No. 3 Sacred Heart 84-72, getting 24 points and eight rebounds from Isaiah Blackmon, and No. 1 Robert Morris pulled away from No. 4 LIU 86-66 in Moon Township.
- The Southern Conference has had a nice run the past couple of years, and its depth showed on Saturday as only one game saw the higher seed win. That was the opener, where No. 1 East Tennessee State took out No. 9 VMI 70-57. No. 5 Western Carolina then beat No. 4 Mercer by an almost identical score of 70-56, No. 7 Wofford knocked off No. 2 Furman in a stunner 77-68, and No. 6 Chattanooga rallied past No. 3 UNC Greensboro 78-68.
- History repeated itself in a bad way for one team in the Summit League Tournament on Saturday, as No. 2 South Dakota State lost in that round for the second year in a row, this time to No. 7 Purdue Fort Wayne 77-74 despite 35 points from Noah Freidel. There was almost another repeat of history as No. 1 North Dakota State barely held off No. 8 Denver 71-69 in the nightcap, as South Dakota State was the top seed last year in getting knocked off.
- First round action in the Sun Belt Tournament saw No. 8 Louisiana take out No. 9 Arkansas State 73-66 and No. 10 Coastal Carolina edge No. 7 UT Arlington 62-61 on a jumper with one second left.
- The West Coast Conference Tournament had its quarterfinals to close out the night, and in fine fashion. First, No. 5 San Francisco pulled away from No. 4 Pacific 72-54, then two guards gave us an entertaining double overtime thriller to close it out. In the end, Jordan Ford (42 points) and No. 3 Saint Mary’s had just a little more in the tank than Colbey Ross (43 points, eight rebounds, five assists) and No. 6 Pepperdine as the Gaels won 89-82.
Your ACC regular season champion is Florida State, which surely no one outside of Tallahassee would have figured before the season. The Seminoles handled Boston College 80-62 in Tallahassee, while just a little later Virginia edged Louisville 57-54 in Charlottesville. Florida State had locked up the top seed in the ACC Tournament regardless since they swept Louisville, but this made it an outright title while also putting the Cavaliers in the tie for second in another great coaching job by Tony Bennett. Later, Duke joined them at 15-5 as they pulled away from North Carolina 89-76. Miami knocked off Syracuse 69-65 without guard Chris Lykes, who suffered face injuries on Wednesday night and remains out indefinitely.
Ho-hum: Kansas won another Big 12 regular season title, and they didn’t even have to break a sweat to do it by the time they played as Baylor lost 76-64 at West Virginia before the Jayhawks managed to hold off Texas Tech 66-62 in Lubbock. The Jayhawks finish 17-1 in Big 12 play, and it’s among other things a testament to Bill Self that he did this with the conference being strong once again and the program receiving an NCAA notice of allegations before the season, which hovered over them all year. Elsewhere, Texas got blasted by Oklahoma State at home 81-59, which might have put the Longhorns right back to where they were at some point during the five-game winning streak they just had in terms of needing to do damage in the Big 12 Tournament, while Oklahoma got 41 points and six assists from Austin Reaves and edged TCU 78-76 in Fort Worth. Kansas State beat Iowa State 79-63 in the other game on the day.
The Big East concluded with a three-way tie at the top as Villanova survived at Georgetown 70-69 and Creighton used a big second half to knock off Seton Hall 77-60. Elsewhere, Marquette had a big second half rally that fell short at St. John’s 88-86, so the Golden Eagles once again head into the conference tournament trending very much in the wrong direction with six losses in their last seven games. Providence will enter heading in the right direction as they manhandled DePaul 93-55 for their sixth straight win. In the last game of the regular season, Butler got 36 points from Kamar Baldwin, including big baskets to rally after losing a lead, and edged Xavier 72-71. Xavier finishes the regular season at a disappointing 8-10 in Big East play, ending a remarkable run of 37 straight seasons with at least a .500 record in conference play going back to their time in the old Midwestern Collegiate Conference (now the Horizon League).
The Big Ten is not quite done, but Wisconsin will have at least a share of the regular season title after they went to Indiana and got past the Hoosiers 60-56 for their eighth straight win. There was a stunner a little later as Northwestern beat Penn State 80-69, which means the Nittany Lions have gone from contender for the top spot in the conference to losing five of six before the Big Ten Tournament. The only other game of the day saw Rutgers pick up a much-needed road win, knocking off Purdue 71-68 in overtime in West Lafayette.
The Ivy League already had its regular season champion before the night began, and that’s a good thing for Yale as Harvard handled them in Cambridge. What was not known was who would join those two and Princeton, who lost 85-82 to Cornell, next weekend in the league tournament. That would be Penn, who blew out Columbia 85-65 behind the first triple-double in program history. Brown beat Dartmouth 70-58, but it didn’t matter as far as the tournament is concerned, a tough one for the Bears as they were in contention up to the final night two years in a row but missed both times.
In the Pac-12, Oregon claimed the regular season title as they pulled away from Stanford 80-67 in Eugene behind 29 points from Payton Pritchard. They won it outright as UCLA lost a heartbreaker at USC a few hours earlier, 54-52 on a last-second three-pointer. Also, Colorado will enter the conference tournament trending in the wrong direction, as they lost their fourth straight, 74-72 in overtime at Utah. At one time the Buffaloes were right there in contention for the top spot in the conference. The same can be said of Arizona, who lost at home to Washington 69-63 in a game that didn’t feel that close, and the Wildcats have lost four of five and will get the Huskies again in first round action in the Pac-12 Tournament on Wednesday.
Kentucky already had the SEC regular season title wrapped up, but the Wildcats rallied for a 71-70 win at Florida to close out the regular season, a further hit to the Gators in a very uneven season for them. Kentucky was without star guard Ashton Hagans, who did not travel with the team for personal reasons. Auburn had an encouraging performance as they blasted Tennessee 85-63 in Knoxville for a rare road win behind 32 points from Samir Doughty. While South Carolina may have harbored some at-large pipe dreams, an 83-74 loss at Vanderbilt will put those to rest and leave them needing to do serious damage in the SEC Tournament, or more likely, a miracle run to win it. LSU thumped Georgia 94-64 and Mississippi State took care of arch rival Ole Miss 69-44, and how about Texas A&M? They finish10-8 in the SEC after beating Arkansas 77-69 in College Station.
Other results of note: Dayton completed a perfect run through the Atlantic 10 by pulling away from George Washington 76-51 as Obi Toppin had 27 more points; Rhode Island held off Tre Mitchell (34 points and 12 rebounds) and UMass 74-73; Saint Louis blew out St. Bonaventure 72-49 behind 16 points and 18 rebounds from Hasahn French; Eastern Washington claimed an outright Big Sky regular season title by knocking off Weber State 78-69; Southern knocked off SWAC regular season champion Prairie View A&M 89-80 in overtime to finish a game back of the Panthers and a game ahead of Texas Southern, who lost 90-75 at Alcorn State; and Stephen F. Austin closed out a 19-1 Southland Conference season and improved to 28-3 overall with a 68-57 win over Sam Houston State.
Tonight’s Menu
It’s mostly conference tournament action that features three more NCAA Tournament bids going out, but the American Athletic Conference and Big Ten close out their regular seasons as well.
- The first NCAA Tournament bid to go out on the day will be in the Big South, where No. 5 Hampton hits the road to take on No. 2 Winthrop (1 p.m.)
- The next bid will be from the Missouri Valley Conference, whose championship game has No. 4 Beadley taking on No. 7 Valparaiso (2:05 p.m.)
- The final bid to go out on the day will come from the Atlantic Sun, where No. 3 Lipscomb travels to take on No. 1 Liberty (3 p.m.)
- The CAA Tournament continues in the nation’s capital with quarterfinal action, starting with No. 1 Hofstra taking on No. 8 Drexel (noon) followed by what should be a good one as No. 4 Delaware battles No. 5 College of Charleston (2:30 p.m.) in the afternoon and continuing with No. 2 William & Mary taking on No. 7 Elon (6 p.m.) before No. 3 Towson takes on No. 6 Northeastern (8:30 p.m.)
- The Summit League Tournament has its last quarterfinals in the evening, where No. 4 Oral Roberts battles No. 5 Omaha (7 p.m.) and No. 3 South Dakota takes on No. 6 North Dakota (9:30 p.m.)
- In the American Athletic Conference, Memphis visits Houston (noon), then UCF hosts East Carolina (2 p.m.), UConn goes to Tulane and Tulsa goes to Wichita State with a chance for an outright regular season title (4 p.m.)
- Big Ten action on the day starts with Maryland hosting Michigan (noon), then Minnesota hosts Nebraska (1 p.m.), Michigan State hosts Ohio State (4:30 p.m.) and Illinois hosts Iowa (7 p.m.)
