It’s very possible to be misled by the name “Patriot League.” The Patriot League is not a competition to see who can exhibit the most patriotism. It’s an athletic conference, and as such, it has a men’s basketball tournament. A tournament in which one team, if they lose, will be NIT-bound.
Like many low-major leagues, the Patriot League has only one team with an NIT chance. Its regular season champion can get an automatic bid with a loss, but no one’s getting an at-large bid, no matter how nicely they ask.
That team—the regular season champion, not the one nicely asking for an at-large bid—is Colgate. You may remember them from their historic defense on the gridiron back in the fall of 2018, or because we dragged their big man, Rapolas Ivanauskas, on this site a short while ago for missing so many threes.
Ivanauskas hasn’t stopped missing threes since we posted that. He’s missed four more. He’s only made one. The man is incorrigible, and Colgate’s going to need his persistent willingness to miss from deep if they’re going to garner an NIT bid over these next three, six, or nine days. Entering tournament play tonight, Colgate’s only 44% NIT likely, and with all three of their possible games at home, plus a reseeding following the quarterfinals (edit: evidently there was no reseeding following the quarterfinals; our apologies), it’s going to take a major effort out of Ivanauskas & Friends™ to nestle themselves in somewhere between a six-seed and an eight-seed (it’s possible geography will yank them around in the bracket).
Their best hopes, when it comes to getting knocked off, are Boston University and American (you can see where these people got the idea of calling themselves something as audacious as ‘the Patriot League’). BU’s led by Max Mahoney, a big man from New Jersey who’s missed 80 fewer threes than Ivanauskas this season while attempting 108 fewer (yes, Mahoney is zero for zero from beyond the arc). American’s led by Sa’eed Nelson, who’s also pretty good at the whole basketball thing, but not in a way that leads conveniently into a comparison with Ivanauskas. BU and American are on the same side of the bracket, and no amount of reseeding will get them up to Hamilton (that’s where Colgate is) before the championship, so it might be a while before Colgate’s really tested. Of course, Lafayette could be coming to Colgate as soon as Sunday, but while the Leopards have beaten Colgate twice on the season, doubts abound as to their health and their willingness to buck the guidance of the notably anti-NIT Patriot League office, which has subtly been pressuring teams to consolidate around Colgate’s shot at the other tournament in some perverted micro-managing that runs contrary to the will of the people (full disclosure, I made up everything after “health” in that sentence).
Beyond Lafayette, Army could get their shot (not a literal one) at the Raiders (that’s Colgate), as could Navy (also not a literal shot), Bucknell (seems less necessary to say this, but not literal here either), Lehigh (you get the point), the Loyola in Maryland, and even Holy Cross. In other words, we just listed every team in the conference because it’s technically possible each could, at some point in this tournament, make the trip to Hamilton and take their shot at assisting their rival’s NIT quest. Amazing when that happens. The NIT really does transcend hate.
Nuts, Bolts:
It’s a standard ten-team bracket, with the 7/10 & 8/9 games happening tonight. The quarterfinals are on Thursday, the semifinals are on Sunday, and the championship’s next Wednesday, so this tournament is not so much an immersive experience as one that will peripherally lurk in your consciousness until Thursday at the earliest and forever at the latest (if something really effed up happens, like a mascot going on a body-slamming spree that leaves multiple cheerleaders with sprained wrists). As has been said, reseeding occurs after the quarterfinals (about 95% sure on this), and Colgate’s the team with an NIT dream (100% sure of that one).
