It was a bad night to be a ranked team last night. Kentucky? Maryland? Pitt? Oh my! Mix in a Mickey Mouse court storming with 22 TCU beating 9 Texas (didn’t even cover…WTF) and we had an incredible night last night.
I’m giddy like a kid on Christmas to watch basketball and golf at work today. I don’t give a shit if it’s some middling FUN Belt or Missouri Valley teams, this is March baby. Get your multiple screens set up and join the festivities. Let’s preview a couple tourneys (other than the Arnold Palmer invitational) getting started today.
Missouri Valley
I’m genuinely curious when this conference is going to get multiple bids into the big dance. I would argue both Bradley and Drake deserve it, but from Southern Illinois all the way down to perennial Ohio Valley champion Murray State is frisky. For about 2 months it looked like Drake was going to run away with the conference, but Bradley pushed their shit in during the regular season conference championship game. The Southern Illinois Salukis were extremely competitive in their 2 point loss to Bradley and were able to muddy the game up enough to keep it in the 50s. They’re not a bad sprinkle to win the damn thing.
West Coast
Gonzaga and everyone else right? Eh… San Francisco had a breakout year last year and showed the country the WCC can be a 3 bid league. Santa Clara has been good to my bank account at times this year, and kept their losses to Saint Mary’s/Gonzaga in the single digits, so maybe they can pull off a miracle in the conference tourney? I don’t buy it. It’ll be another Saint Mary’s/Gonzaga championship, and I’m ecstatic for this years matchup.
Both conferences getting set to play should be multi-bid leagues in my eyes, especially in a year where there is not one clear-cut #1 team. It’s time to stop unrespecting these leagues, respectively.
The Morning Flush 