An Interesting Twist

The Atlantic Sun conference championship takes place tomorrow, when the Stetson Hatters take on the Florida Gulf Coast Coasters (actually, the Eagles). As we mentioned yesterday, only four entrants chose FGCU (L Leach, Sa Leach, Marshall, Rybaltowski). None chose Stetson, for good reason, as the Hatters are ineligible for the NCAA Tournament.

So what happens if Stetson wins? Well, the answer lies in an article we linked to a couple weeks ago. If you don't feel like clicking, we'll give you a spoiler: if an ineligible team wins the Atlantic Sun, then the regular season champion is awarded the conference's automatic bid. Which means if Stetson wins, then the 59 of us who chose North Florida get a second chance at the points. An interesting twist, wouldn't you say?

Moving along, the first bid of 2016 was claimed today. And nobody cared. At least nobody affiliated with our contest. That's because not a single one of us was clever enough to choose Austin Peay as OVC champion. As the old cheer used to go, "1-2-3, Let's Go Peay."

The top Big South seed, High Point, lost today, much to the chagrin of the 22 of us who chose the Panthers to win their conference. The conference final will take place tomorrow, between Winthrop (taken by 28) and UNC-Ashville (itemized by 11).

In the MVC, overwhelming favorite Wichita State (selected by 65 out of 67) went down to Northern Iowa (schelected jucsht by shrewd L Schlegel), which will square off in the conference final tomorrow against Evansville (not selected by anybody).

In the NEC, our favorite composing hoopsters, Wagner (picked by 50) will face off against Fairleigh Dickinson (picked by Fitch, M Josephs, M Peloso, Selig, R Simon, and M Wanger).

G'night now. More tomorrow.