As of today, 14 conference tournaments will be in progress, meaning more than half of the conferences have started tournament play. It becomes impossible to post a blog entry containing every single scenario, but I'll hit the highlights and dive deeper where it makes sense. New conferences tipping off today include the America East and Big Sky. The Big Sky begins first round play today, which includes seeds 7-10, ultimately no impact to our pool. The America East does not have a first round, and starts with its quarterfinals. This means every team is playing, and we're all at risk of a loss. (1) Vermont is our overwhelming consensus pick with 71% of the action, which means that we do have a few (2) UMass Lowell and (3) Bryant picks. Vermont is favored by 17, I would assume they move to the semifinals, but we've seen this not go well already this week.
The Northeast Conference semifinals will be wrapped up early this afternoon with high seed (1) Central Connecticut and (2) Merrimack both looking to advance to the championship. Our remaining pool picks are almost split evenly across these teams, with nobody on (4) Le Moyne or (6) Wagner. With our pool picks being so evenly split, the tournament champion in this conference could be significant for our pool. 🏀
Similarly, the Big South conference semifinals will be wrapped up early this afternoon with (1) High Point vs. (5) Longwood, and (2) UNC Asheville vs. (3) Gardner-Webb. This conference is a bit more complex to breakdown in terms of our pool selections because we have an even split between the top seeds, but we also have people on the bonus point seeds. The Big South semifinals and finals will be huge when it comes to shaping the pool standings.
A few minutes after the above conferences tip off for the day, the Southern, and Sun Belt, will start quarterfinals play, again putting everyone in the pool at risk of a loss. This first Saturday of conference tournaments is a tough one as most of us will rack up losses, without many opportunities to secure a win due to so few championship games. It really does no good to expand on any of the matchups or pool details, we'll get to that in the semifinals. 🏀
Later in the afternoon we have another conference starting semifinals play, the Missouri Valley. It's all chalk with (1) Indiana State vs. (4) Northern Iowa and (2) Drake taking on (3) Bradley. Arch Madness has been terrible so far, I'm hoping these games are a bit more exciting. We have pool picks on all of these teams, except for Northern Iowa. If you have not been able to see Robbie Avila play for Indiana State yet, also known as Cream Abdul Jabbar, Larry Nerd, Larry Blurred, Steph Blurry, and Milk Chamberlain, definitely tune in today.
Although I did not talk about the Coastal Athletic, because the games have no impact to our pool, this about covers everything until the evening. I plan on updating the standings throughout the afternoon, without a blog entry, and I'll post a blog entry previewing the Ohio Valley championship game before it tips off tonight. We only cover conference tournaments here, but we have a great slate of basketball games outside of conference tournaments as well. Good luck to everyone today! 🍀
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