Basketball! Basketball? Basketball!
ToNITe’s NIT-impacting action:
UNC
- 7:00 PM EST: UNC @ Florida State (ESPN)
No rest for the weary, and UNC is getting tired of us saying their name.
The Tar Heels don’t need to lose this to make the NIT. They have other routes. But this would be a great way to undo any momentum they accumulated on Saturday beating a team that’s disintegrating in front of our very eyes.
To be honest, I’d feel better if FSU hadn’t beaten Miami. Feel like UNC can’t sleep on them now.
Other Upper Bubblers
- 9:00 PM EST: Baylor @ Oklahoma State (ESPN)
- 9:00 PM EST: West Virginia @ Iowa State (ESPN2)
- 9:00 PM EST: Nevada @ Wyoming (CBSSN)
Nevada is a key cog in a lot of Mountain West equations right now, sitting right on the NET line where one side is Q1 home opponents and one side is Q2 home opponents. Drop this one, and not only do they get dangerously close to our precipice, but they probably bring Utah State with them. This is what people mean when they say basketball is a team sport.
Oklahoma State and West Virginia each probably need two more wins each, here and in Kansas City, to avoid us. Normally, we’d therefore be cheering for them to lose. This year’s different, though. This year we are extremely emotionally attached to UNC.
Conference Tournament Season
- 7:00 PM EST: FGCU vs. Queens (ESPN+)
- 7:00 PM EST: Bellarmine vs. North Florida (ESPN+)
Remember Bellarmine? The pride of the press? They’re back to try it again, and they aren’t nearly as good as last year’s team, but last year’s team wasn’t great either. That was part of what made that little NIT campaign so insulting.
If you’re trying to place what we’re talking about here, the situation is this: The NCAA has a rule where teams that are new to Division I sports can’t play in NCAA-run postseason tournaments (like the NIT) for their first five years. I don’t know why this exists, but my guess is that it’s so schools don’t try to bounce back and forth? Seems dumb, regardless. Anyway, Bellarmine knew about this rule last year, but they didn’t realize the NIT was included, so they got really mad when they didn’t get to hang out with us after they won the ASUN Tournament. This was a fair response, but it led to a lot of people treating the NIT like a place for feel-good stories rather than serious basketball. If that was what the NIT was about, John Krasinski would have sold it to CBS by now.
Bellarmine presumably knows the rules this year. But. Does Queens? Because Queens is in the exact same boat, just a year or two behind Bellarmine on the schedule. And for another wrinkle, if one of these two does win the ASUN Tournament, Kennesaw State has to play in the NCA* *********t, opening up a spot in the NIT by not giving Kennesaw State that automatic bid.
The ASUN might not have very many good basketball teams, but it knows how to make itself the story. Respect.
Other Auto Bid Action
- 7:30 PM EST: Norfolk State @ North Carolina Central
- 7:30 PM EST: Howard @ South Carolina State
- 7:30 PM EST: Morgan State @ Maryland Eastern Shore
- 7:30 PM EST: Grambling State @ Bethune-Cookman
- 9:00 PM EST: Texas Southern @ Alcorn State
I spent a lot of time on Saturday trying to find channels for SWAC games, and I’m not doing that again. Love you, SWAC, but that wasn’t fair. Not seeing channels for either the MEAC or the SWAC tonight, though I do think the MEAC has streaming on its teams’ sites.
The situations in these leagues are that Grambling is better than Alcorn in the SWAC and Norfolk is better than Howard and NCCU in the MEAC (even though Norfolk’s a road dog tonight). So, fans of teams on the NIT bubble want Grambling and Norfolk to win these leagues, since they’ll be conference tournament favorites no matter what.
Right now, Grambling and Alcorn are tied with three to play. It’s a footrace. In the MEAC, Norfolk and Howard are tied, but NCCU and UMES are a game back. We don’t think UMES can win the league, but we think they might be able to involve themselves in the tiebreaker scenario, so we’re listing them here for anyone who wants to get even weirder than us.
Obviously, any Norfolk State/NCCU/Howard/Grambling/Alcorn fans reading these want their teams to win their leagues so they can make the NIT as automatic bids. That much is straightforward, which is why we led with the bubble stuff.
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More tomorrow, with a lot more conference tournaments kicking off. People, as they say, get ready.
What’s with the random, super dated Krasinski dig? It’s a lame non-sequitur. It’s not even accurate, he announced ages ago he never went through with the CBS sale for his YouTube show. He also raised something like 10M for a bunch of social causes, Covid supplies & charities while/after it ended. Snark is really not warranted in this case.
Didn’t know it never sold! We were just trying to crack a joke. Clearly missed on this one. No hate intended towards John Krasinski.
It didn’t go through because he was laundering the money. None of it ever made it to the recipients. Learn.
Note from The Barking Crow: All allegations made in our comments are merely allegations and should not be treated as fact.
Note from the Barking Crow again: We can edit your comments! This is neat.
Wow! If John Krasinski did this, which we for legal reasons will point out is merely an allegation, perhaps even a parodic one, *that* would be a good John Krasinski joke. And the joke would be on us!