[The Poet]

There are actually two NCAA games tonight, as you likely know, and so let's talk about them a bit.


Mississippi Valley State vs. Western Kentucky = These two mid-majors will battle for the right to get spanked by the UK Wildcats come Thursday. Hey, on the bright side, one of them will get a win in the NCAAs, right? The Delta Devils won the SWAC, and if they can survive and advance this evening it shall not be the first time this season they have faced top-flight opposition. Already this year they played Notre Dame, UNC, Arkansas, Northwestern, Ole Miss, Florida, and Wisconsin. That's a tough non-conference schedule by anyone's account. Of course, they lost them all, but at least they know what it is like to face tough matchups. The SWAC is not that tough, and the only quality non-conference win they got was against Tennessee State, the school that spoiled Joe's Racers perfecto. As for the Hilltoppers, they stunk up the Sun Belt all year long, but made a run to take the conference tourney and snag the automatic as a sub.500 team. Oddly, their only quality win this year was against Tenn. State too, but their "quality" losses were not as good, being to St. Joe's, VCU, Louisville, and Joe's Racers of Murray State. Western Kentucky has a better program historically, but I feel that the Delta Devils may have the better team this year. Still, I admit I don't know enough about either squad to give you a gimme here.


BYU vs. Iona = Nor do I here either, though again I am confident that the WCC is better than the MAAC. The Cougars finished 3rd in that league, yet still got the at-large, while the Gaels finished 1st in the regular season but failed in their tourney, and was a surprise to many that they got the at-large in the first place. That should tell you something. Speaking of Gaels, those from St. Mary's, as well as Gonzaga and San Francisco, give you some idea how tough the WCC could be. BYU had good wins over Nevada, Oregon, Utah, and Virginia Tech, with the Lobos being the only one that truly impresses me, while they lost to Wisconsin and Baylor outside the league. Iona lost to Purdue and Marshall, both a step down from those Ls above, with good wins over Maryland, St. Joe's, Richmond, Vermont, and those Nevada Lobos again. At the start of the season many experts picked Iona to be the main Cinderella story this year, and I give them a fair chance of surviving a Fredette-less BYU team. On the other hand, I do believe the Cougars have faced some consistently tougher competition, so they won't back down either. Flip a coin, enjoy the game, then wait to see who gets a shot at Marquette on Thursday.


If you have any insight, input, questions, objections, complaints, whines, boasts, whatever, feel free to pipe up. And if you wanna talk any NIT or other alphabet-soup tournament, just say so. Until later then, enjoy.