One of the greatest times of the year is finally upon us. For some of you out there, March brings hope of warmer weather and a break from school; for us basketball fans we get the true madness before the madness–conference tournaments. These next 2 weeks before the tournament are usually more crazy than the actual tournament itself. We’ll break down EVERY conference and go through the contenders and dark horses. There’s always one sub .500 team that punches their ticket to the dance this time of year, let’s find them sum bitches.
Ohio Valley
Murray State let the entire conference know it’s them and everyone else in the Ohio Valley after they beat the piss out of Belmont. I hyped that game up so much, just for the Bruins to go out and shit down their leg. Belmont and Morehead (lol) State are other “contenders”, and have looked like they could be at-large bids at times this season, but neither of them could knock off Murray State. To humor you, SIU Edwardsville has been frisky against the top 3 teams in this conference, and recently beat Morehead (lol) State. They’ve also beat Purdue FW, Youngstown State and Kansas City during their non-conference schedule and had a close loss to Creighton by 5. Not saying they’re worth a sprinkle, but don’t be surprised if it comes down to the last minute against Murray State in the quarterfinals.
Big South
This looks like a two horse race between Longwood and Winthrop, but there are some frisky ass teams in this conference. I do believe Winthrop is the most complete team in this conference, and have been putting them in my bracket as a 14 seed, but I’m surprised how quickly this conference caught up to them after they ran through this conference last year handily. You can probably find good value with Gardner-Webb, who plays excellent defense and can turn any game into a rock fight. Some frisky sub-.500 teams include South Carolina Upstate, Radford and the High Point Panthers who seem like they are in “win it for Tubby Smith” mode. Of these teams, SC Upstate is the most frisky at 10-6 in conference play including a season sweep of Gardner-Webb.
Picks: Winthrop +200, Gardner-Webb +500
West Coast Conference
This conference got a lot more interesting with Saint Mary’s upset over Gonzaga during Saturday night’s ridiculous slate of upsets. There’s still no way Gonzaga doesn’t win this conference, but it’s nice to see some parity in a league that’s been so one sided for so long. Everyone is balls deep on the San Francisco bandwagon, but I’m not buying their bullshit. They’re 10-6 in conference and their best non-conference win is to Davidson…and everyone is shitting on the A-10, so I don’t understand the hype. If you’re looking for a sub-.500 team who could give a couple teams a scare, the Pacific Tigers beat BYU earlier in the season, but they’ll have to face Gonzaga if they get past Loyola Marymount…it’s the Zags and everyone else, regardless of how much you fell in love with Saint Mary’s this weekend.
Sun Belt
There have been so many first place teams in this conference, it’s hard to keep track of who is currently in the lead. Texas State looks like they could legitimately upset a team in the first round, but they’ve also played 3 less games than most teams in their conference. Their last loss came 9 games ago to a UT Arlington team who is the most under the radar team in this conference. They’ve beat some of the top dogs such as Troy, Georgia State, and Texas State. They were also frisky in their non-conference games. I think your best value pick for the Sun Belt would be Troy. They’ve been in a constant win/loss back and forth for a while, but they went 4-1 against the top dogs in this conference during the regular season.
Picks: Texas State +250, Troy +700
We’re just getting started with day two of our conference tour. Missouri Valley, Southern, Colonial and Summit are next. The MVC and Summit tournaments will be cage matches.
The Morning Flush 