Tourney Central 3/4/2009 (Day 2)
Bullet Points
- Championship Fortnight is under way, as the top seeds won in the Big South and Ohio Valley.
- The first minor upset occurred in the Horizon League, where No. 7 Illinois-Chicago outhooped No. 6 Youngstown State. Both finished the conference slate at 7-11 and were separated by tiebreakers.
- Three more leagues start up their tourneys tonight: the Patriot League holds quarterfinals at campus sites, the Sun Belt plays out its first round at five locations, and the Atlantic Sun begins with a single first round game.
- There are eight games happening tonight.
Brackets
Big South
Regular season champion Radford was none too concessionary in its huge home win over low seed High Point, and conference player of the year and former MMBOW Artsiom Parakhouski led all scorers with 24. Winthrop, not used to quarterfinal exits of late, fell in the revenge rematch of the 2008 championship at UNC Asheville. Then the Eagles' team bus caught on fire. Liberty's Seth Curry, recently named the league's top freshman, matched the family jersey number with 30 points as the Flames easily dispatched new BSC member Gardner-Webb. VMI set up a home rematch of last week's 40-point drubbing at Liberty by defeating Coastal Carolina; four Keydets were in double figures as they avoided a third straight close game with the Chanticleers.
at [3] Liberty 88, [6] Gardner-Webb 77 | GameFlo
at [4] North Carolina-Asheville 76, [5] Winthrop 68 | GameFlo
at [1] Radford 82, [8] High Point 58 | GameFlo
at [2] Virginia Military Institute 96, [7] Coastal Carolina 76 | GameFlo
Horizon League
Cleveland State struggled to shake free of No. 10 Detroit for over 26 minutes before running off the Titans. Valparaiso managed just 34 percent shooting in its season-ender on Wright State's floor. Milwaukee tried to put Loyola away early, but the Ramblers were able to cut a 20-plus deficit in half late. And in that small upset, Rob Eppinger chose a good time to have his first double-double of the season. UIC's secret 6-8 weapon scored 20 points (quadruple his 2008-09 average) and added 14 rebounds.
at [3] Cleveland State 56, [10] Detroit 43 | GameFlo
[7] Illinois-Chicago 73, at [6] Youngstown State 68 | GameFlo
at [4] Wright State 68, [9] Valparaiso 56 | GameFlo
at [5] Wisconsin-Milwaukee 77, [8] Loyola (Ill.) 68 | GameFlo
Ohio Valley
Done Ruthless done dropped 42 points on Tennessee Tech in UT Martin's 18-point blowout; the Skyhawks advance to Nashville's Sommet Center on Friday to play Morehead State, which crushed Eastern Kentucky on the glass 43-15 en route to an easy win. Tennessee State won't ride a No. 6 seed to the final again; the Tigers' season ended with a 14-point loss at Murray State in which the Racers shot 59 percent. The only close game was league champion Austin Peay's escape against upstart Eastern Illinois. The Govs risked losing their first game in the series since 2005 and trailed for most of the evening, until the APSU defense held EIU without a field goal for the final 6:52 of the contest.
at [4] Morehead State 91, [5] Eastern Kentucky 72 | GameFlo
at [1] Tennessee-Martin 93, [8] Tennessee Tech 75 | GameFlo
at [2] Austin Peay 57, [7] Eastern Illinois 54 | GameFlo
at [3] Murray State 88, [6] Tennessee State 74 | GameFlo
On Tap Tonight
Atlantic Sun
Gardner-Webb, recently seen losing in the Big South quarters, left the league last summer, so the conference only has seven qualified applicants for the conference tourney title. This is the final year of this particular sort of madness, as North Florida and Kennesaw State finally complete their move up from Division II in 2010. For now, Jacksonville -- which was embarrassed in the title game last year by Belmont -- owns the top seed and gets a bye to the semis as a result of the unbalanced bracket. Three-time champion Belmont will come out of the No. 3, its lowest seed since 2005. ETSU will open its title shot tonight against Stetson, which disappointed after looking good on paper coming into the season. Mercer, the school with the most impressive nonconference résumé (wins over Alabama and Arkansas), comes in as a No. 6, mostly due to the Bears' struggles with handling pressure defense.
9:30 pm ET - [7] Stetson 13-16 (9-11) vs. [2] East Tennessee State 20-10 (14-6) | Preview
Recent: 02/09/2009 STET 64 @ETSU 63 01/10/2009 ETSU 73 @STET 67
Patriot League
If this year's quarters are anything like last year's, it'll be the best slate of the week by far. You may recall Bucknell's 7-over-2 3OT win over Navy, or Army's extra-time upset winner at Lehigh. The latter will be replayed, at West Point this time. More shades of the recent past in this year's 2/7 game, as the Bison and Crusaders will party like it's 2006 (or 2007). American rolls into its title defense on a 10-game win streak.
And yes, this is the longest tourney in Hoops Nation, at 10 days. The champion will be crowned on Friday, Mar. 13.
7:00 pm ET - [7] Bucknell 7-22 (4-10) at [2] Holy Cross 16-13 (11-3) | Preview
Recent: 02/14/2009 BUCK 72 @HC 66 01/17/2009 HC 68 @BUCK 56
7:00 pm ET - [6] Colgate 9-19 (5-9) at [3] Navy 19-10 (8-6) | Preview
Recent: 02/28/2009 COLG 64 @NAVY 77 01/31/2009 NAVY 75 @COLG 64
7:00 pm ET - [5] Lehigh 15-13 (5-9) at [4] Army 10-18 (6-8) | Preview
Recent: 02/14/2009 LEH 75 @ARMY 82 01/17/2009 ARMY 57 @LEH 77
7:30 pm ET - [8] Lafayette 8-21 (4-10) at [1] American 21-7 (13-1) | Preview
Recent: 02/28/2009 AMER 75 @LAF 68 01/31/2009 LAF 65 @AMER 78
Sun Belt
Every year, we like to point out the ridiculousness of playing a campus-site first round in a league that stretches from Florida to Colorado. Louisiana-Monroe has to travel 1,164 miles on short notice to play Denver as punishment for its lousy season, and Mike Jarvis' bottom-seeded Florida Atlantic squad has to go 1,355 miles to inevitably finish its campaign at North Texas. At least New Orleans only has to drive two hours to Mobile to play South Alabama, a team that really struggled to stop 3's after its NCAA appearance last year. While surprises do happen (No. 12 Troy won at No. 5 Lafayette last season), just take the top eight, stick them in one building, and save everybody some money.
8:00 pm ET - [13] Florida Atlantic 6-25 (2-16) at [4] North Texas 18-11 (11-7) | Preview
Recent: 01/17/2009 FAU 60 @NTEX 69 01/19/2008 NTEX 81 @FAU 86 
8:00 pm ET - [12] Arkansas State 13-16 (5-13) at [5] Middle Tennessee 17-13 (10-8) | Preview
Recent: 01/22/2009 ARST 57 @MTSU 60 02/04/2008 MTSU 89 @ARST 86
8:05 pm ET - [11] New Orleans 11-18 (6-12) at [6] South Alabama 17-12 (10-8) | Preview
Recent: 01/31/2009 UNO 53 @USA 56 03/09/2008 UNO 77 @USA 81
8:30 pm ET - [9] Florida International 12-19 (7-11) at [8] Louisiana-Lafayette 10-19 (7-11) | Preview
Recent: 02/05/2009 FIU 73 @ULL 90 02/06/2008 ULL 72 @FIU 62
9:00 pm ET - [10] Louisiana-Monroe 10-19 (6-12) at [7] Denver 14-15 (9-9) | Preview
Recent: 02/26/2009 DEN 66 @ULM 57 01/11/2009 ULM 47 @DEN 58
