3/9/07

It was a wild, wild day all across college basketball in general and in the ACC in particular. Let's review the ACC games...

Florida State 67, Clemson 66 - I'll put aside the question of whether Al Thornton actually was fouled at the end of the game. This was a huge win for the Seminoles, and an equally huge loss for Clemson. Clemson is now done, as far as the NCAA tournament goes - they are NT bound, no question. FSU's fate is still up in the air. A win today over UNC and they are in. A loss, and it will be an interesting Selection Sunday in Tallahassee. As weak as this year's bubble is, I think they would have a fairly good shot.

Miami 67, Maryland 62 - The Terps came into this one obviously thinking that they could just show up and run Miami right out of the gym, but quite the opposite happened. The Hurricanes controlled the tempo pretty much the entire way and walked Maryland out of the gym, at least in the first half. In the last part of the game, Maryland finally got some measure of control, but it was too late for the Terps, who will go into the NCAAs with their pride stung by a second loss to the ACC's worst team. Maryland came into this game sitting at about a 4 seed. If they performed well in this tournament, they could have moved their seeding up to 3 or even 2. With the loss, however, they will be lucky if they don't fall to 5 or 6.

North Carolina State 85, Duke 80 - The only good news for Maryland is that when they lose it is news, but when Duke loses to NC State the same day, everyone forgets about Maryland's loss and starts yammering about the Blue Devils. This is obviously the weakest team Duke has fielded in recent memory, and now they have an agregate 8-9 ACC record.They're still in the tournament, but are probably looking at a 9 or maybe even a 10 seed.

Wake Forest 114, Georgia Tech 112 (2 OT) - Wow. Georgia Tech came into this game with an NCAA berth *probably* wrapped up, and needing only a win over lowly Wake Forest to seal the deal, but look what happened. Does Tech still get into the tournament? Probably. Will they be unnecessarily sweating it out on Selection Sunday? Yeah.

Ok, when I made my last post, 9 teams had locked up their conference's automatic NCA berths. They were: Pennsylvania, Winthrop, Eastern Kentucky, Davidson, Belmont, Creighton, Virginia Commonwealth, Niagara, and Gonzaga.

Since then, 5 other schools have punched their tickets:

Wright State defeated Butler in the Horizon League final on Tuesday.
North Texas defeated Arkansas State on Tuesday to win the Sun Belt Championship.
Central Connecticut State won the Northeast Conference Championship by defeating Sacred Heart on Wednesday.
Weber State topped Northern Arizona on Wednesday to win the Big Sky Conference Championship.
Oral Roberts won the Mid-Continent Conference final over Oakland on Tuesday.

That leaves 17 conference tournaments still going, all to be decided between tonight and Sunday:

The Patriot League final is tonight between Holy Cross and Bucknell.
The America East Conference final is tomorrow between Vermont and Albany.
The MEAC Tournament is down to Florida A&M, North Carolina A&T, Morgan State, and Delaware State. The semis are today, the final is tomorrow.
The Mountain West Conference Tournament is down to Brigham Young, Wyoming, Nevada Las Vegas, and Colorado State. The semis are today, the final is tomorrow.
The WAC Tournament is down to Nevada, Utah State, Boise State, and New Mexico State. The semis are tonight, the final is tomorrow.
The Atlantic 10 Tournament is down to Xavier, Rhode Island, Saint Louis, and George Washington. The semis are tonight, the final is tomorrow.
The Big East Tournament is down to Georgetown, Notre Dame, Louisville, and Pittsburgh. The semis are tonight, the final is tomorrow.
The Big West Tournament is down to California Irvine, Long Beach State, California State Fullerton, and California Polytechnic. The semis are today, the final is tomorrow.
The Conference USA Tournament is down to Rice, Houston, Memphis, and Tulane. The semis are tonight, the final is tomorrow.
The MAC Tournament is down to Toledo, Miami, Akron, and Kent State (yes, that Kent State). The semis are today, the final is tomorrow.
The Pac 10 Tournament is down to California, Oregon, Washington State, and Southern California. The semis are today, the final is tomorrow.
The SWAC Tournament is down to Mississippi Valley State, Texas Southern, Jackson State, and Arkansas Pine Bluff. The semis are today, the final is tomorrow.
The ACC Tournament is down to North Carolina, Florida State, Boston College, Miami, Virginia, North Carolina State, Virginia Tech, and Wake Forest. The quarterfinals are today, the semifinals are tomorrow, and the final is on Sunday.
The Big 12 Tournament is down to Kansas, Oklahoma, Kansas State, Texas Tech, Texas A&M, Oklahoma State, Texas, and Baylor. The quarterfinals are today, the semifinals are tomorrow, and the final is on Sunday.
The Big Ten Tournament is down to Ohio State, Michigan, Iowa, Purdue, Wisconsin, Michigan State, Indiana, and Illinois. The quarterfinals are today, the semifinals are tomorrow, and the final is on Sunday.
The SEC Tournament is down to Mississippi State, Kentucky, Vanderbilt, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Mississippi, and Louisiana State. The quarterfinals are today, the semifinals are tomorrow, and the final is on Sunday.
The Southland Tournament is down to Lamar, Northwestern State, Texas A&M Corpus Christi, and McNeese State. The semifinals are today, and the final is on Sunday.

Next time I post here, the brackets will be all filled out.

Till then...