Postseason Schedule
(St. Louis, MO) – Four Missouri Valley Conference teams are playing postseason basketball. Two participate in tomorrow’s National Invitation Tournament’s opening round. Drake plays early in the NCAA Tournament’s opening round Thursday and Illinois State waits until Saturday for College Basketball Invitational action.
Valley Teams in the NIT
Bradley (26-8) is a three seed in one of the NIT’s four quadrants. The Braves face North Alabama (24-10) at 7 pm on ESPN+ but will be missing one of their starters. Earlier this week it was announced that Darius Hannah and Zek Montgomery would opt out of the NIT, sighting their agents’ advice.
Hannah has since changed his mind and plans on playing.
Bradley’s NCAA Tournament dreams were dashed at Arch Madness and the Braves could be ‘on a mission’.
They face a Lions team that has a similar bad taste in its mouth. North Alabama tied Lipscomb for the ASUN regular season title and lost to the Bisons in the ASUN Tournament.
Bradley has to slow down Jacari Lane (17.4 points and 4.1 assists) and Lion offense, averaging over 79 points per game. Lane is a 41 percent three point shooter.
How Brian Wardle re-works his Montgomery-less rotation will be key to Bradley winning this home game. The winner of the George Mason/Samford contest awaits the winner of this contest.
Northern Iowa (20-12) faces top-seeded SMU at 8 pm on ESPN2. Ben Jacobson’s team lost three of its last four to miss the NCAA Tournament. While the final loss was to the then extremely hot Valparaiso team, the first two were defeats at the hands of Drake and Bradley.
SMU (23-10) finished a distant fourth in the Atlantic Coast Conference (13-7) and is a highly efficient offensive team. The Mustangs are 43rd in effective field goal percentage and rank 47th at kenpom.com.
Guards Boopie Miller (13.2 & 5.5 apg) and Chuck Harris (12.8) are a handful and forward Matt Cross is a multidimensional player.
Drake Faces Missouri in the Big Dance
Ben McCollum’s team will be a trendy pick to win a six/eleven matchup. The Bulldogs and Tigers toss it up at 6:35 pm on truTV. Mizzou’s top scorer, Mark Mitchel has been gimpy and missed time recently.
The high scoring Tigers can compensate for his loss, but the suffocating Drake defense and methodical Bulldog offense will cause great problems for Dennis Gates’ free-wheeling Tigers.
Illinois State in the CBI
The Redbirds wait until Saturday to begin the College Basketball Invitational. Ryan Pedon’s team faces a curious selection, Presbyterian (14-18). The ‘Blue Hose’ won their final three regular season games.
Illinois State (19-14) looks for its twentieth win at 1 pm, Saturday and can be seen on FloHoops.
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Flooding, lightning strikes, etc. have cost @RacersHoops two home games. Had to play 'neutral site' tonight instead of at home and Wednesday's goes from home to away. Tough break for the Racers, and the whole area has been hit with difficulties. #FatherHarry
Murray State's scheduled home game Wednesday vs. Southern Illinois being moved to Banterra Center in Carbondale. #ValleyHoops
Gigantic game for @BradleyUMBB today in Des Moines. If they have a chance to catch @DrakeBulldogsMB, they have to win today. The Bulldogs can basically win the title today. @BustingBrackets breaks it all down. #FatherHarry https://bit.ly/3EGiVgi
Not rooting for any particular @ValleyHoops, but chaos is always fun. If things break certain ways, after today there could be a six-way tie for fifth place.
Fun to listen to @MLBLarry on the @SIU_Basketball/@BelmontMBB game tonight. Good job brother. #FatherHarry
