As the schedule moves to March, a lionshare of the NCAA schedule is conference tournament games. There were three Top 25 teams in action Friday night, with one team moving to a conference championship game. Also, outside of Top-25 action, Yale beat Harvard to become the first team to clinch a bid to the NCAA tournament. As the season quickly wraps up, every one of these games is crucial to NCAA touranment seeding.
Let’s get to the games:
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Southern Illinois Salukis | 45 | (12-21) |
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(8) Wichita State Shockers | 56 | (28-3) |
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In a Missouri Valley Conference quarterfinal, Wichita State moved on against Southern Illinois. Wichita State was paced by 13 points and three steals from Fred VanVleet. Southern Illinois was held to only 34% shooting and turned the ball over 18 times, showing Wichita State’s fierce defensive output. This should be the end of the season for Southern Illinois and Wichita State will play Illinois State in the semifinals of the Missouri Valley Conference tournament.
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Bradley Braves | 46 | (9-24) |
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(11) UNI Panthers | 71 | (28-3) |
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In another Missouri Valley conference quarterfinal, Northern Iowa knocked off Bradley. Nate Buss had 23 points and added six rebounds off the bench for Northern Iowa, who had 10 made three point field goals. Bradley was only down by two points at halftime, and paced by 16 points from Omari Grier, but only shot 33.3% from the field. Bradley will see their season end and Northern Iowa looks to Loyola-Illinois in the Missouri Valley Conference tournament semifinals.
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Morehead State Eagles | 77 | (17-17) |
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(25) Murray State Racers | 80 | (27-4) |
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Murray State fought off a furious rally from Morehead State to earn a bid in the Ohio Valley Conference Championship. Cameron Payne had 25 points for Murray State and Jarvis Willams had 23 points and 10 rebounds as the Racers had no bench points. Morehead State, who rebounded from an 11 point halftime deficit to lead by as much as 10 points with 7:24 remaining, was lead by 22 points and 10 rebounds from Karam Mashour and 20 points from Kareem Storey. Morehead State sees their season end a hardluck loser while Murray State faces Belmont in the Ohio Valley Conference championship game.
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Texas Tech Red Raiders | 74 | (13-18) |
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(14) Baylor Bears | 77 | (23-8) |
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Baylor closed their Big 12 schedule with a victory against Texas Tech. Taurean Prince scored 24 points and grabbed nine rebounds for Baylor, who shot a stellar 56.8% from the field. Texas Tech, who led by as much as 11 points, was led by 28 points and eight three point field goals from Devaughtah Williams. Both teams turn their focus to the Big 12 conference tournament, where Texas Tech is currently the 10th seed and Baylor is the fourth seeded team.