March Moments – What Lies Ahead

Valley Hoops Insider Remembers Classic March Moments

(St. Louis, MO) – Missouri Valley Conference teams have made a habit of stealing the NCAA Tournament limelight from college basketball’s power brokers. While this year’s tournament has been canceled, we thought we would relive some of those ‘March Moments’. During the three weeks of what would have been ‘March Madness’ we will enjoy ‘March Moments’.

We’re including teams that have left the league and even one that made its history before it joined Valley. We’ll talk to coaches, broadcasters and players about these improbable journeys to greatness and national exposure.

1998 was my first year of covering Arch Madness. While working as a stringer for a national news network, I ended up announcing seven of the games for a local radio station. I was hooked on the Valley.

That year Dan Muller’s Illinois State Redbirds won the tournament and several weeks later Valparaiso’s unexpected trip to the Sweet Sixteen ended in St. Louis. I was hooked on covering college basketball.

For the next several years I announced more Arch Madness games (on radio) than anyone. I was the play-by-play voice for virtually every game for about a decade. For a while, I was known as the ‘Voice of the Valley’ (on radio – I don’t hold a candle to the true ‘Voice of the Valley’ Mitch Holthus!). Don’t believe me? Here’s the evidence.

 

 

I enjoyed a season of broadcasting a ‘Valley Game of the Week’ on Sirius Satellite Radio too.

In December of 2013 we launched ValleyHoopsInsider.com.

The March Moments

My first exposure to ‘the Madness’ was seeing Illinois State’s second of two straight MVC Tournament titles and their fierce rivalry with the Creighton Bluejays. CU’s Rodney Buford and ISU’s Rico Hill were elite-level players.

But watching Homer Drew’s Valpo team lose in St. Louis after that dramatic game winner by Bryce Drew got me hooked.

Those early 2000s Creighton teams produced conference championships, tournament championships and all conference players so consistently that media members started calling the tournament the ‘Dana Altman Invitational’. Creighton won the 1999, 2000, 2002, 2003, 2005 and 2007 titles. The Creighton coach was always classy and humble while piling up titles and awards.

The mid-2000s were the Valley’s hay-day! Several Sweet Sixteen runs occurred, one season the Valley sent four teams dancing (2006). The 2007 semifinals and finals set attendance records of 22,612 each session. It was a heady time.

Shocker-Mania

The 2010’s saw the advent of ‘Play Angry’ coming out of Wichita State and coach Gregg Marshall. Numerous ‘March Moments’ would follow. WSU crashed the blue-bloods’ party by advancing to the 2013 Final Four. Future NBA players Fred VanVleet, Ron Baker and Cleanthony Early were amazing college basketball stars and Tekelle Cotton might have been the nation’s best collegiate defender.

Marshall and the Shockers followed their 2013 Final Four season with a 34-0 record on their way to a # 1 seed. After a first round win they lost to Kentucky in a classic contest before a partisan St. Louis crowd. The Shockers went back to the Sweet Sixteen in 2015.

Down Goes Kansas!

Who can forget the 2010 Northern Iowa team filled with players whose names we couldn’t pronounce from Ali Farokhmanesh, Kwadzo Ahelegebe, Jordan Eglsedar and Adam Koch (like cook, not Coke). One of the all-time great March Moments.

 

Loyola Comes Aboard

When Creighton left the Valley there was great hand wringing and the addition of a little Catholic school in Chicago didn’t grab national attention, until it did. The Ramblers made their own Final Four adventure in 2018.

From last minute, game winning shots, to Sister Jean’s rise to fame, the Ramblers have ushered in our latest March Moments.

 

Stay close to ValleyHoopsInsider.com. We will relive numerous March Moments with those that know those moments best.

The league has sent several players to the NBA, made noise during the regular season and has produced some electrifying March Moments.

Do Good