So now with the MIAC Championship Game in the books as well as other conference tournaments in our area (Region 9), it's now time to start peering into the bigger picture and scheme of things with Selection Monday coming up tomorrow (Monday 2-26) afternoon at 1:30 P.M. So let's take a glance at things:
MIAC - The Gusties get the dominant win yesterday over Concordia to get the automatic bid to the Dance. The best guess here is that GAC will have to take its show on the road when the pairings get announced Monday afternoon and if I were a betting man, I'd be surprised if they didn't get shipped off to a WIAC venue (again) as they did last year. Of course, the big question now swirls around Concordia's hopes of getting in. Given that Wartburg held off Loras yesterday in the ARC Championship Game down in Waverly, IA and given that the Duhawks were behind the Cobbers in the last release of the Regional Rankings, I have to believe that there's at least a path there for Concordia. I can't guarantee that obviously but I THINK there's reason for hope here. And should the Cobbers get in, I would venture that they'd get shipped down to Waverly where Wartburg seems to be in a good spot to host a pod there.
WIAC - This will be a three-bid league again by virtue of UW-Stout coming into the WIAC Playoffs as the third seed where the Blue Devils proceeded to run roughshod over UW-River Falls, UW-Whitewater and then UW-Oshkosh in the WIAC Championship Game on Friday evening. You can bet that both the Warhawks and the Titans will receive bids as well and it wouldn't surprise me one bit if they both get to host. It will be interesting to see where UW-Stout gets placed tomorrow afternoon. They could get placed at the Wartburg pod but given the fact that UW-Oshkosh got sent out to Ada, OH last year at the Ohio Northern pod, it wouldn't surprise me if the Blue Devils have a Michigan/Indiana/Ohio landing point come Monday afternoon.
ARC - As mentioned earlier, the Knights get the conference's automatic bid by virtue of their win over Loras yesterday and I think one would have to surmise that Wartburg will ultimately wind up hosting a first/second-round pod. The tricky part here obviously is Loras as the Duhawks were in the seventh spot in the last round of the Region 9 rankings. Loras does have a win over Elizabethtown (Region 5) right before the Christmas holiday but were swept by Wartburg during the regular season. Not that I would necessarily have a problem with the Duhawks getting in BUT I would have an issue with them getting in ahead of Concordia - especially when you consider that Loras was the beneficiary of an extremely controversial call with :00 left in regulation in their conference semifinal game versus Coe on Thursday night (and if I'm Coe Head Coach Kayla Waskow, I'd still be fuming over how this one ended and I hope she marched right over to ARC headquarters right there in downtown Cedar Rapids to vent her frustrations) that kept their season alive. So it's an extremely dicey situation when it comes to Loras.
UMAC - UM-Morris shocked everyone by going up to the shores of Gitche Gumee yesterday and knocking off heavily-favored host UW-Superior to snare the conference's automatic bid and ending a great season for the Yellowjackets. Where the Cougars wind up getting placed tomorrow afternoon is anyone's guess but I'll bet that they'll be headed to Waverly.
MWC - Ripon defeated Knox yesterday to claim the conference's automatic bid to the Dance and they'll be a one-bid league.
The only other intangibles I can think of off the top of my head at the moment were over in the MIAA where we saw Trine pull off a huge upset of host and heavily-favored Hope last night in the MIAA Championship Game so obviously the Thunder burst somebody's bubble with that win. The NWC is another puzzle entirely as regular season champ Willamette meekly bowed out to eventual NWC Championship Game-champ Puget Sound as the Loggers get that conference's automatic bid and whether the NWC gets another team in is anyone's guess at the moment.
So make sure you get tuned into the NCAA Selection Show tomorrow afternoon at 1:30 P.M. which will be available on D3Hoops.com and we'll see how everything unfolds.
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