Day Three of the CTC is the last “rest day” before the craziness that is the first weekend. The Big South is the first conference to hit the semis. The A-Sun continues their quarters from last night. The NEC gets going. And, The Valley, one of the two jewels of the first week (along with the Colonial, which starts tomorrow) has a pair of opening round games, as an appetizer to a quarterfinal quadruple-header tomorrow in St. Louis. Lohse followed up a perfect Day One with an imperfect, but victorious Day Two, so we’ll see if he can continue. Lynch tied Lohse yesterday to get him back in business after a bit of a struggle on Day One. And, Teddy began with Patriot League perfection yesterday and is very much in the running for the top spot. Day Three…next.
BIG SOUTH SEMIFINALS (8 points each):
At the end of the day, we will have our first championship matchup, as the first conference to play their semis is the Big South. Two nights ago, all four top seeds took care of business on their home floors, and now the scene shifts to Coastal Carolina for a semifinal double-header at the home of the top seeded Chanticleers. Bry is the defending champion of the Big South, taking the title from Stri, who won in ’08.
#3 Winthrop vs. #2 Radford. In the first half of the semifinal double-header in Conway, SC (the Coastal Carolina homecourt), the past two Big South champions will meet for a spot in the finals. This game is as big as it gets in the Big South, as far as The Challenge goes. Five have Radford (Teddy, Lynch, Waters, J, and Ina) and seven have Winthrop. But, even more importanly, four people have their champion playing in this game. Alexi, Lil Lohse, and KA have Winthrop winning this tournament. Ina believes in a Radford repeat this year.
#4 UNC-Asheville at #1 Coastal Carolina. The top-seed in the Big South gets to host the semifinal double-header tonight, and that honor goes to C. Carolina. The team that pays the “road” price is UNC-Asheville, as they are the road team in this semifinal. In a very rare near-consensus finalist, 11 of the 12 contestants have C. Carolina winning this game and advancing to the Big South title game. The only dissident is Waters, who has UNC-Asheville winning this game and the whole tournament.
MISSOURI VALLEY OPENING ROUND (6 points each):
The greatest name for a conference tournament, “Arch Madness,” kicks off today in St. Louis. The conference affectionately known as “The Valley” is our first non-1x conference to get underway. A lot of points are awarded in The Valley, so the importance is ramped up. This is the most valuable tournament of the first week of games (along with the Colonial), so the early leader might be decided by the results in St. Louis. Stri is trying to repeat as The Valley champion, after edging out Ina and Alexi last year. In ’08, Ina dominated The Valley with a whopping 120 points. J is trying to right the ship in this conference after back-to-back last place performances.
#10 Evansville (2-16) vs. #7 Missouri St. (8-10). Evansville made something out of a pretty awful season by knocking off nationally-ranked N. Iowa last week. They will try to take that momentum into their opening round matchup with Missouri St. The Bears, on the other hand, started strong, but have struggled down the stretch. They had a great non-conference, where they went 10-1, including wins over Auburn and St. Louis. Their only non-conference loss was a close loss at Arkansas. But, they did not carry that into conference play, and even fell a game short of a first-round bye, so their shot at redemption has to start tonight. It’s a pretty big game for The Challenge because both of these teams figure into a couple of our brackets in big ways. Both Lohses have Evansville in the upset, and Big Lohse actually have Evansville winning two games in the tournament, so he’s up for some big-time upset points if that comes through. Everyone else has MSU in the first-round, but Bry and Doogan both have them beating Wichita St. in the next round. And, Teddy has even more faith in the Bears. He has them coming from the opening round to win four games in four days and winning Arch Madness.
#9 S. Illinois (6-12) vs. Drake (7-11). It is teams like the Salukis of SIU that remind us just how impressive the Gonzaga run has been over the last decade-plus. It looked, for a time, that SIU would be that “mid-major” that became a national contender year in and year out. But, much like fellow conference-mates like Creighton and Bradley and other mid-majors with “aspirations,” like Winthrop, Davidson, E. Michigan, VCU, Vermont, Hofstra, Utah St., and even the Final Four program of George Mason have fallen victim to the difficulties of sustained success at the mid-major level. Even Siena, once this class graduates will probably slip back. But, of all of these teams, it looked most of all like the Salukis would have staying power. They were built around defense and hard-nosed play (things you can teach non-McDonald’s All-Americans). But, it just hasn’t happened. They slipped to just about rock-bottom this year, finishing 9th place in the Missouri Valley. Well, they have one last four-game run to make something out of this season and it starts tonight against The Valley’s darlings of two years ago, Drake. Most people in The Challenge actually took the Salukis in a minor upset over Drake. No one who picked Drake has them beating N. Iowa in the next round. And, all of those who took SIU, only Teddy has them going to the semis. So, this game is biggest for Teddy because if he can get two wins from the Salukis, he is in for a ton of upset points.
ATLANTIC SUN QUARTERFINALS (4 points each):
The Day After… The A-Sun continues in the aftermath of #1-seed Lipscomb falling to #8-seed Kennessaw St. The 3- and 4-seeds are in action today, as J tries to continue his path towards an A-Sun three-peat.
#5 E. Tennessee St. (13-7) vs. #4 Campbell (14-6). Campbell, despite finishing in a tie for first, loses the tiebreaker and has to play ETSU (the preseason conference favorite who only finished a game out of first) in the first round. This is a big swing game in The Challenge because very few people seemed to have faith in #1 Lipscomb (and now they’re gone), so many people have a finalist coming out of this quarterfinal matchup. Actually, most people like the underdog ETSU squad in the first round, as only three (KA, J, and Lohse) have Campbell here. J and Lohse have Campbell in the finals. Shockingly, more than half the field (Bry, Stri, Alexi, Waters, Ina, Teddy, and Lynch) actually have ETSU in the finals.
#6 Mercer (10-10) vs. #3 Belmont (14-6). Technically, this is a “neutral-site” conference tournament game, but it is played on the campus of Mercer University. Bry and Lohse both have Mercer in this one–together again for an A-Sun upset, so who knows. This time, though, they are the only two that believe in the underdog. An upset here would be rough on Teddy, J, Doogan, and Stri, as they all have the Belmont Bruins taking the A-Sun. And J, after nailing the KSU upset yesterday and being the two-time defending champion in this conference, knows his A-Sun hoops.
NEC QUARTERFINALS (4 points each):
And, the NEC kicks off tonight with four quarterfinal matchups between the eight teams that qualified for the NEC tournament (4 teams were left out of the mix). Quinnipiac and defending champ, Robert Morris, tied for the regular season title, but Quinnipiac won the tiebreaker and grabs the #1 seed. All games in this tournament will be at the home courts of the higher seeds. The quarters are tonight, with the semis on Sunday and the finals next Wednesday. Stri is the man to beat in the NEC, as he is the two-time defending champion in this conference, including last year’s title defense with a PERFECT bracket. Bry also had this conference perfect last year, so they were the ’09 co-champs.
#6 St. Francis (PA) (9-9) at #3 Mount St. Mary’s (12-6). MSM starts their NEC title quest with a home game against St. Francis (PA). Even though all 12 contestants picked MSM to win this game, this game has the potential to make some major waves in the CTC. Half of the field (more than any other school) has MSM winning the entire tournament. Throw in KA and Ina, who have MSM going to the finals, 8 of the 12 contestants will be really hoping that MSM avoids the big upset tonight.
#8 Monmouth (8-10) at #1 Quinnipiac (15-3). The top-seeded Bobcats of Quinnipiac open their quest for The Dance with a home game against a decent Monmouth team who struggled down the stretch to fall to 8th place. Waters is the only one who picked Monmouth in what would be a KSU-like upset. In fact, Waters believes so much in the Jersey school, that he has them goig to the finals of the NEC tournament, so this would be a huge upset for him tonight. Bry, Doogan, Ina, Stri, and KA have the top-seeded Bobcats winning this whole tournament.
#7 C. Connecticut St. (9-9) at #2 Robert Morris (15-3). The defending champs and this year’s co-champs, Robert Morris, grabs the #2 seed and home games all the way through unless they get QU in the finals. The CCSU Blue Devils are the first ones to head to Pittsburgh to take on the Colonials in this year’s NEC tourney. Lynch and KA both have this big upset, though neither of them have CCSU going any further. Somewhat surprisingly, only Lil Lohse has Robert Morris winning this tournament, so this game is big for him.
#5 Farleigh Dickinson (10-8) at #4 Long Island (11-7). The LIU Blackbirds ended up with the hotly-contested #4-seed with a couple final week victories. Their reward? A first-round home game before a semifinal that will probably be on the road against the top-seed. FDU struggled down the stretch, but put it together enough to grab the #5-seed. There are not that many CTC implications in this one because no one has either of these teams going any further than this round. J, Waters, and Lil Lohse all went for the minor upset of FDU.
