Previewing Tuesday's Conference Tournament Games
Going to be doing this daily since we’re now in March and it’s just a cleaner look. We’ll take a look at conference tournament games going on each day and put conference championship games in their own blog. This will have updated brackets, what’s going on, etc. I’ll be talking about the games all day @barstoolreags, so join me there and let’s get right into it.
America East
Semifinals
This tournament is absolutely Vermont’s to lose. They have lost just 1 conference game over the last two years and believe it or not the Catamounts are actually getting better during this thing. Vermont welcomed back Anthony Lamb – arguably its best player – a couple of games ago after missing a good portion of the season to injury. I talked to John Becker about this a couple weeks ago and he talked about how the injuries and guys missing time have helped develop other players faster. That will pay off in this type of situation. Developing a bench and getting guys more experience in conference games is absolutely huge for a win or go home scenario. Now, the America East is a little different because of the breaks between games, but it’s still a tournament setting. Vermont, typically known for its defense, has been a better offensive team this year – ranking 40th in KenPom and a large part of that is 3-point shooting. They rank 189th in 3PA/FGA and 11th in 3pt%. The other key here for Vermont? The Catamounts are a top-10 defensive rebounding team in the country. Being able to limit possessions when the game slows down is just so important. I’m taking Vermont and Hartford to win here tonight.
ACC Tournament
Opening Round
I wrote an entire breakdown of the ACC Tournament. You can read it here.
Big Sky Tournament
First Round
While I don’t think we see anything crazy in this tournament, we should see great shooting. As KenPom points out, the Big Sky is the best 3-point shooting conference in the country. The conference as a whole is shooting 37% from three. Montana is the favorite in this event and quite a heavy favorite as well with a 38% chance to win the tournament. Montana is led by a junior class consisting of Jamar Akoh, Ahmaad Rorie, Michael Oguine and Bobby Moorehead. The four of them score 53.4 of the teams 77 points per game while all playing over 25 minutes per game. Montana suffered just two losses in conference play – back to back road games to Idaho and Eastern Washington. Tyler Hall was supposed to be the star of this conference as he is an NBA prospect for some, but Montana State fell to the 9 seed. If Montana stumbles before the finals, keep an eye on Northern Colorado at the 5 seed.
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MEAC Tournament
First Round
We almost got a huge upset last night in the MEAC with Delaware State beating North Carolina A&T. It did count for something though as Delaware State jumped up over Alabama A&M, who is now the worst team in college basketball. We have more quarterfinal games today including one that Maryland stoolies will be interested in. Juan Dixon is the head coach of Coppin State and while its an 11 seed, it’s still Juan Dixon. I expect the higher seeds all to win tonight, but if you actually want to watch some entertaining basketball, cheer for Bethune-Cookman vs Savannah State in the semifinals. Both teams play a ridiculous fast pace and really just want to get up and down the court and shoot a bunch. It’s hilarious and awesome to watch all at once. I still think the champion though will come from the top half of the bracket with Hampton as a heavy favorite or Norfolk State getting the homecourt advantage.
SWAC Tournament
Quarterfinals
The best team in the SWAC isn’t in the SWAC Tournament. That’s due to Grambling being ineligible for the postseason. So we have an 8-team tournament with Pine-Bluff as the one seed now. Don’t be surprised to see some mayhem happen here. Arkansas-Pine Bluff ended the season 3-5 and Southern can really bother them in the semifinals. I’m going to down with Texas Southern, a team typically in the NCAA Tournament under Mike Davis. Not to mention Texas Southern does have Demontrae Jefferson, a 5’7″ guard who just go gets buckets. He’s averaging 24 per game and has a sidekick in Donte Clark who is averaging 18 per game. Texas Southern also has the most experience out of this group as it typically schedules nothing but ridiculous road games in the nonconference. This year they played Gonzaga, Washington State, Ohio State, Syracuse, Kansas, Clemson, Oregon and TCU.