{"id":259,"date":"2009-03-05T22:01:03","date_gmt":"2009-03-06T03:01:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.broadstreetbelievers.com\/?p=259"},"modified":"2009-03-09T17:09:28","modified_gmt":"2009-03-09T22:09:28","slug":"ctc-day-3-preview","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/?p=259","title":{"rendered":"CTC Day 3 Preview"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Day 3 is going to be an interesting day.\u00a0 The Big South is playing their semifinals; the Atlantic Sun quarters conclude (after starting last night); the NEC debuts with its quarterfinal round; and, the 3x tournament in the Missouri Valley (the &#8220;Arch Madness&#8221;) opens tonight with their opening round games.<\/p>\n<p><strong><u>BIG SOUTH SEMIFINALS:<\/u><\/strong><br \/>\nTwo nights ago, on Day 1, the Big South played their 4 quarterfinal games.\u00a0 They took a day off and now they have their two semifinal games on Radford University.\u00a0 Last year, Stri (42), Alexi (38), and J (38) performed best in this conference.\u00a0 Bry (20) and Waters (16) performed the worst.\u00a0 As for the quarterfinal rounds, only Lynch lost a finalist&#8211;he actually lost both of his and is finished&#8211;and Ina and Waters were perfect in the quarters.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><em><u>#1 Radford vs. #4 UNC-Asheville<\/u><\/em>.\u00a0 Other than Lynch (who had Winthrop winning this game), everyone except Waters has Radford moving on to the finals.\u00a0 Waters would pull a big win if UNC-Asheville pulls the upset.\u00a0 Radford is coming off a shellacking of High Point, while UNC-Asheville beat a tough Winthrop team.<\/li>\n<li><em><u>#2 VMI vs. #3 Liberty<\/u><\/em>.\u00a0 This game is going to be great in both a basketball context and a CTC context.\u00a0 VMI was 13-5 in conference play and Liberty was only a game back at 12-6.\u00a0 They also split their two regular season games.\u00a0 As far as the CTC goes, this game is going to go a long way in determining the winner of the CTC Big South.\u00a0 Ina, Doogan, and Alexi all have Liberty winning the whole thing.\u00a0 Waters and J have VMI winning the whole thing.\u00a0 Bry and Stri have less of a stake, as they both took Radford to win the whole thing, but for the upset points, they both took Liberty to win this game.\u00a0 A very important game in the context of the 2009 CTC Big South titleholder.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong><u><!--more-->MISSOURI VALLEY OPENING ROUND:<\/u><\/strong><br \/>\nThe conference familiarly known as &#8220;The Valley&#8221; kicks off tonight, with the tournament, which they have dubbed &#8220;Arch Madness.&#8221;\u00a0 This 10-team tournament starts with two opening round games between the bottom 4 seeds.\u00a0 Points in this conference are worth 3x, so even these first round games can make a difference.\u00a0 Ina crushed this conference last year with 120 points.\u00a0 Waters was\u00a0the only one close with 102 points.\u00a0 No one else even reached 80.\u00a0 J had a disappointing 24.\u00a0 This year&#8217;s race for the CTC Missouri Valley will probably have a lot to do with these early rounds, considering that all 8 people picked Creighton to win this tournament.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><em><u>#7 Wichita State (8-10) vs. #10 Missouri State (3-15)<\/u><\/em>.\u00a0 The Bears of Missouri St. had a disappointing bubble-bursting NIT selection last year and this year, they struggled to a 3-15, last-place conference record this year.\u00a0 Wichita St. limped to the finish, costing themselves a first-round bye.\u00a0 Only Stri took Missouri St. in the upset.\u00a0 Obviously, no one had either of these teams winning more than one game, considering everyone had Creighton winning it all.<\/li>\n<li><em><u>#8 Drake (7-11) vs. #9 Indiana State (7-11)<\/u><\/em>.\u00a0 Drake, the darlings of last year&#8217;s MVC lost their coach and 11 conference games this year.\u00a0 They open their MVC title defense tonight against Indiana St.&#8211;without Larry Bird.\u00a0 Apparently Bry and Stri hate the Drake, as both took the Sycamores in the mild upset tonight.\u00a0 Waters and J have Drake going to the semis.\u00a0 Doogan has them all the way to the finals.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong><u>ATLANTIC SUN QUARTERFINALS:<\/u><\/strong><br \/>\nWith the split-up quarters in the A-Sun, E. Tennessee St. won last night and the other two games are tonight.\u00a0 Two games tonight, with all 4 teams with at least 11 conference wins.\u00a0 This should be a good night in Nashville.\u00a0 Interesting note on the picks this year:\u00a0the only favorite that Stri took in the A-Sun tournament was when he picked #5 Campbell to defeat #6 Mercer in the finals.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><em><u>#3 Belmont (14-6)\u00a0vs. #6 Mercer (11-9)<\/u><\/em>.\u00a0 Belmont, the two-time defending A-Sun champs open their postseason tonight against Mercer.\u00a0 J and Stri both have Mercer upsetting the Bruins tonight, for 6 upset points.\u00a0 Bry, Alexi, and Waters will be watching with increased interest, as they all have Belmont winning this tournament.<\/li>\n<li><em><u>#5 Campbell (11-9) at #4 Lipscomb (12-8)<\/u><\/em>.\u00a0 Lipscomb, playing the whole tournament on their home floor, opens their postseason tonight against the #5-seed Campbell.\u00a0 For a quarterfinal between the #4 and #5 seeds, this actually has somewhat major CTC implications.\u00a0 Half of us have the Campbell upset here in the first round (Waters, Alexi, Stri, and J).\u00a0 Stri even has Campbell winning this entire tournament.\u00a0 Doogan and Ina both have Lipscomb winning the whole thing.\u00a0 Plus, Bry and Lynch have them losing in the finals.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong><u>NEC QUARTERFINALS:<\/u><\/strong><br \/>\nThe NEC kicks off their 8-team tournament tonight at the campuses of the higher seeds.\u00a0 Last year, the NEC saw a large discrepency, despite being a 1x conference.\u00a0 Stri won last year&#8217;s NEC with 48 points, followed closely by J with 44.\u00a0 But, Ina only had 16; Bry had 8; and, Doogan had a mere 4 points.\u00a0 This year&#8217;s tournament has two of us picking #2 Mt. St. Mary&#8217;s to win it all (Alexi and Waters) and 1 picking #5 Quinnipiac (Lynch).\u00a0 The other 5 have #1 Robert Morris winning this tournament.\u00a0 No one picked the solid #3-seed, Sacred Heart to win it all.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><em><u>#8 St. Francis (NY) (7-11) at #1 Robert Morris (15-3)<\/u><\/em>.\u00a0 The league&#8217;s best team, the Robert Morris Colonials open their postseason tonight with a game against St. Francis (NY), which barely held off Farleigh Dickinson and Monmouth to even make the NEC tournament.\u00a0 Waters is the only one tempted by the 14 potential upset points here, as he took St. Francis (NY) to upset the top seed.\u00a0 Everyone else had RMC, with Everyone but Lynch and Alexi having the Colonial win it all.<\/li>\n<li><em><u>#7 Wagner (8-10) at #2 Mount St. Mary&#8217;s (12-6)<\/u><\/em>.\u00a0 Mt. St. Mary&#8217;s, the two-time defending conference champs open their postseason tonight at home against a very tough Wagner team.\u00a0 Doogan is the only one to go for the 10 upset points with Wagner.\u00a0 Waters and Alexi have Mt. St. Mary&#8217;s winning this whole tournament.<\/li>\n<li><em><u>#6 Central Connecticut State (8-10) at #3 Sacred Heart (12-6)<\/u><\/em>.\u00a0 Two of the conference&#8217;s more successful programs meet in the quarters tonight in Fairfield, CT.\u00a0 The Pioneers of Sacred Heart had another great season, but lost the tiebreaker to Mt. St. Mary&#8217;s, which means they get a tough Blue Devil team in the quarters.\u00a0 Lynch and J both took CCSU in the 6-point upset pick.\u00a0 Surprisingly, not one of us took Sacred Heart to win the whole thing, but Ina and Doogan both took them to make the finals.<\/li>\n<li><em><u>#5 Quinnipiac (10-8) at #4 Long Island (12-6)<\/u><\/em>.\u00a0 A red-hot Quinnipiac team goes to Long Island to face a very good home team in LIU.\u00a0 The winner probably gets rewarded with a trip to Robert Morris in the semis.\u00a0 Only J and Alexi took the Blackbirds of LIU in this game.\u00a0 Everyone else took the mild upset.\u00a0 Lynch even has Quinnipiac winning it all.\u00a0 Waters has them in the finals.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Day 3 is going to be an interesting day.\u00a0 The Big South is playing their semifinals; the Atlantic Sun quarters conclude (after starting last night); the NEC debuts with its quarterfinal round; and, the 3x tournament in the Missouri Valley &hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/?p=259\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,479],"tags":[490,484,492,491],"class_list":["post-259","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-college-hoops","category-conf-tourney-challenge","tag-atlantic-sun","tag-big-south","tag-missouri-valley","tag-nec"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/259","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=259"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/259\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=259"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=259"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=259"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}