Friday, March 6, 2015

The Weekend Ahead, March 6-8

Before we dig in on this weekend's best mid-major games, we want to let everyone know that this will be the last preview of games we do for this season. Conference tournaments are in full swing, and we have (or will have) previews of each and every one of the mid-major conference tournaments. Here are links to the ones we've done already:
Keep an eye out for the ones that are coming soon:
  • Summit
  • MEAC
  • SWAC
  • MAC
  • Southland
  • C-USA
  • A-10
  • Mountain West
  • WAC
  • Big Sky
  • Big West
  • Sun Belt
OK, now back to the Weekend Ahead:


Return of the MAC
Friday, March 6, 7:00PM Bowling Green @ Buffalo

There is a three way tie for first place in the MAC East, and two of those teams play on Friday night. If Kent St. beats Akron, the winner of this game will share the MAC East title with the Golden Flashes. If Kent St. were to lose, the winner of this game will take it outright. Buffalo is the hot team coming in. The Bulls have won 5 straight games by an average of 13 points. Two of those wins were over Bowling Green and Kent St. Buffalo beat the Falcons on the road by 12 less than 2 weeks ago. Can they repeat that performance at home? Bowling Green, on the other hand, is just 2-3 in their last 5 including a head-scratching loss to Miami (OH). If they're going to win the MAC East, they will need to find the team who won 5 of 6 games in late January and early February.

Poison Ivy League
Friday, March 6, 8:00PM Yale @ Harvard

Officially, the Ivy League's automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament won't be determined until Saturday. Unofficially, it will be decided Friday night at 8:00. Yale and Harvard are tied atop the Ivy League standings at 10-2, and the winner of this game will take a 1 game lead with just 1 game to play. Harvard ends the season at home against Brown, who is just 4-8 in Ivy League play. Yale ends the season at Dartmouth, just 5-7. The path to this game has been a wild one. Harvard lost at home to Dartmouth to open Ivy League play and then needed overtime to get by Brown. They evened up the standings by beating Yale on the road, though, and looked to once again claim the Ivy League crown when Yale lost to Columbia on February 21. Not a week later, Harvard lost by 8 points to Cornell. So here we are. Yale and Harvard, with everything on the line.

 Orion's Sun Belt
Saturday, March 7, 2:00PM Georgia Southern @ Georgia St.

Both teams avoided possibly look-ahead losses in their games leading up to this one. Georgia Southern came from behind to beat UT-Arlington, and Georgia St. came from behind to beat UL Monroe. That means this game will be for the regular season Sun Belt championship. That, of course, comes with an automatic bid to the NIT, but, perhaps more importantly, the winner will get the number 1 seed in the conference tournament and set themselves for a run at an NCAA Tournament bid. Georgia St. has won 10 of 12 coming in, but one of those losses was to Georgia Southern. They will get the Eagles at home this time, though. Georgia Southern has not won more than 2 in a row since late January, but they have also not lost two in a row all season long. And they haven't been blown out of a game yet. Their biggest loss of the season was by 9 points to Illinois, an NCAA Tournament bubble team. It should be a great game between two teams who desperately want the Sun Belt's auto-bid to the Big Dance.

James Bond Will Return in...Big Skyfall
Saturday, March 7, 5:05PM Sacramento St. @ Northern Arizona

This game was all set to be Sacramento St.'s crowning moment. A win was supposed to give them the regular season Big Sky title. How, then, did the Hornets drop a game to a, frankly, not very good Southern Utah team on Thursday? Your guess is as good as ours. That loss makes the Big Sky race a wide open affair. Three teams enter the last day of the regular season tied for first place. Sacramento St. has the biggest challenge of the three with their game against Northern Arizona. The Lumberjacks are a game behind the leaders and have an outside chance of sharing the regular season crown. That, of course, would require a win over the Hornets. Northern Arizona lost to Sacramento St. by 5 on the road earlier this year, but that was in early January. They have played good basketball since then going 12-4. If they can pull off the upset, they will need Eastern Washington and Montana both to lose too, if they want to share the regular season championship. That may be asking for a bit much. EWU plays Weber St., a team they beat once this season and should be favored to beat again. The Eagles are just 3-3 in their last 6 games, though. Montana plays Montana St. in a game they certainly should win, but you can never count out a rival. The Big Sky finale is going to be fun to watch this weekend.

C-USA: From Sea to Shining...Texas
Saturday, March 7, 5:30PM Western Kentucky @ Old Dominion

Louisiana Tech is the Conference USA regular season champion. They have a 2 game lead over both Old Dominion and Western Kentucky. This game is important, though, because ODU is still clinging to at-large hopes. They have that nonconference win over VCU, an RPI of 46, and 6 wins over teams in the RPI top 100. What has hurt them has been their play in C-USA. They started conference play just 4-3. A month ago they were at just 7-5. Their at-large hopes were all but gone. They have since rallied, though, winning each of their last 5 games including a 19 point pounding of LaTech. ODU is playing well, and a number 2 seed in the C-USA Tournament could set them up a championship run. Western Kentucky, for their part, has won 3 straight since dropping 4 in a row. They're back in the conversation for that C-USA 2 seed and certainly won't roll over for the Monarchs.

This Land is Your Land, This Land is Southland
Saturday, March 7, 7:30PM Sam Houston St. @ Stephen F. Austin

Oh, boy. This one is going to be good. Stephen F. Austin is, and has been, the king of the Southland Conference. The Lumberjacks are 49-4 in regular season Southland games over the last 3 seasons, including 16-1 this year. They're so good, we even did a blog on their Cinderella hopes in the NCAA Tournament. See it here: http://definemidmajor.blogspot.com/2015/02/searching-for-cinderella-stephen-f.html. Sam Houston St. has proved to be a worthy challenger this season, though. The Bearkats are 15-2 in Southland play and have only lost to Stephen F. Austin and Texas A&M Corpus Cristi (the same team who beat SFA this year). Both teams are strong offensively. Stephen F. Austin scores almost 80 points per game, good for 9th most in the nation. They're 1st in the country in assists per game and 6th in field goal shooting percentage. They will score and do it at will against most teams. Sam Houston St. is 34th in the country in points per game and 3rd in offensive rebounds. Look for this to be a high-scoring game. And look for both teams to make some noise in post-season tournaments. 
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