Missouri Valley Conference Basketball Tournament First Round Recap

2010 Missouri Valley Conference Tournament

Missouri Valley basketball is regularly competitive, but this mid-major league has been especially combative in 2010. Aside from regular season champion Northern Iowa and last-place Evansville; no other teams separated themselves by more than one game from anyone else in the division. Spots 2 through 9 in the 10-team league were all decided by less than two games. Second-place Wichita State edged out Illinois State by one game. Illinois State finished one game ahead of Creighton for third in the Valley. Creighton landed one game ahead of Bradley and Indiana State for fourth, and so on.

This dynamic shows that a typical Valley game is contentious, punishing, and demanding of extra effort in the latter stages of the competition. Playing 35 solid minutes doesn't mean much if one's level of concentration flags in the final five minutes of regulation time.

With this backdrop serving as prelude, then, it was little surprise that the first two teams to exit the 2010 Missouri Valley Conference Tournament were the teams that finished in ninth and tenth place during the regular season. Southern Illinois (6-12 MVC) and Evansville (3-15 MVC) both put up a good fight in the first round of "Arch Madness" at the Scottrade Center in St. Louis, but the Salukis and Purple Aces both failed to cross the finish line first. Two teams whose seasons are now over will be left to lament the ways in which a good fight did not become a winning battle on Thursday night in the Gateway City.

Game 1: (8) Drake 63, (9) Southern Illinois 61

The sad and snake-bitten season endured by Southern Illinois came to an all-too-familiar end in the first game of the tournament. SIU lost its ninth game by five points or fewer, proof positive that the Salukis never learned the fine art of winning close contests. As is the case with other teams who fall far short of the NCAA Tournament, the kids from Carbondale, Ill., regularly played just well enough to lose. Regularly competitive and normally very stout on defense, coach Chris Lowery's club often excelled for 36 or 37 minutes but then faltered in the home stretch. This dispiriting two-point setback against Coach Mark Phelps and the Drake Bulldogs was no exception.

The outlook appeared bright for the SIU crew with 8:41 left in regulation. The ninth seed in the tournament held a 51-41 lead and was thoroughly shutting down Drake at the defensive end of the floor. The eighth-seeded Bulldogs - who scored just five points in the game's first 10 minutes - had briefly recovered to take a 31-29 lead just 74 seconds into the second half, but when Southern Illinois responded with a 10-0 run, the Salukis re-established control and gained a 39-31 cushion at the 15-minute mark of regulation time. Several minutes later, SIU had maintained that multi-possession lead, and it appeared that the Salukis had a better-than-even chance to take on top-seeded Northern Iowa in Friday's first quarterfinal.

Alas, the Salukis couldn't learn the lessons that were taught to them in a hard-luck regular season, when eight white-knucklers evaded their grasp.

Yes, a ninth nail-biter - decided by five points or fewer - didn't break in the right direction for Lowery's lineup, which faltered at the same time that Drake became even more determined. The boys from Des Moines, Iowa, threw down their own brand of big-league defense to hold SIU scoreless for three minutes and 47 seconds as crunch time neared. When the Salukis broke their scoring drought with 4:54 left in the second half, Drake had climbed in front by a 54-53 margin. The two teams settled in for a bumpy ride to the final horn, and in a manner consistent with the unfolding of the regular season, Southern Illinois was left holding the short end of the stick.

The Salukis - who went just 10 of 21 at the foul line, the game's most revealing statistic - missed 4 of 6 free throws in the final nine minutes. That development helped Drake to enter the final half-minute with possession of the ball in a 61-61 stalemate. When Drake's Josh Young then nailed a 10-foot jumper with one second left on the clock, the Bulldogs had earned a sweetly satisfying triumph. Southern Illinois had been nipped at the wire once more.

Maybe next year, Southern Illinois will get it right in the final minutes of a close game. The 2009-2010 season proved to be all wrong for one of America's most unfortunate basketball teams.

> Find the best online selection of MVC apparel & merchandise including SIU clothing & Drake Bulldogs apparel through DFN Sports sites!

 

Game 2: (7) Missouri State 52, (10) Evansville 46

The Evansville Purple Aces did not have the problems Southern Illinois unsuccessfully wrestled with all season long. Coach Marty Simmons' squad got blown out - or at least, comfortably eclipsed - in most of its losses, but in Thursday night's second opening-round act, the athletes from Indiana seemed to take a page from the SIU playbook.

It was setting up so well for the last-place team in the Valley. With just 3:22 left, the Aces weren't quite wild, but the No. 10 seed did lead Missouri State, 46-45. The seventh-seeded Bears, under the direction of second-year coach Cuonzo Martin, found themselves on the verge of crashing out against the league's cellar-dweller, and a sense of underdog-fed excitement coursed through the home of the St. Louis Blues.

That optimistic Evansville vibe didn't last much longer.

The Purple Aces missed their last six shots in regulation, including a blown layup by guard Ned Cox with 2:43 left. Missouri State didn't light up the scoreboard in the final three minutes of the game; the Bears hit only one field goal in that timespan on a night when they made just 33.3 percent of their field goal attempts. Yet, that one field goal was enough to get the job done.

When MSU guard Adam Leonard - 1 for 7 from the field - hit his only shot of the game, a 3-pointer with 33 seconds remaining, the Bears had earned a 50-46 advantage. Evansville couldn't get to the foul line or find other creative ways of manufacturing points. Therefore, as the Aces went scoreless in the final 3:22 of regulation, the men of Missouri State were able to advance to the quarterfinal round.

WHAT'S NEXT

Friday's Quarterfinal Schedule
Day Session: Top Half of Bracket

1:05 p.m. ET: (8) Drake vs. (1) Northern Iowa - The Panthers are likely in the NCAA Tournament, but they would do well to avoid a bad loss in their first Arch Madness game. A win here would give Coach Ben Jacobsen's club a modest amount of breathing room on Selection Sunday. Ideally, UNI would like to reach Sunday's final and make it very hard for the Selection Committee to leave the Panthers out of the Big Dance in the event that another team snags the Valley's automatic bid.

30 minutes after Drake-UNI: (5) Bradley vs. (4) Creighton - One of these teams wants to play and then knock off Northern Iowa in Saturday's semifinals. The fourth-seeded Bluejays have greatly disappointed, as Coach Dana Altman - who spurned the Arkansas job and returned to Omaha in a startling turnabout - must be wondering what went wrong this past season. If Creighton doesn't make a strong push here in St. Louis, the program will spend a long and difficult offseason trying to put the pieces together in many more ways than one.

Night Session: Bottom Half of Bracket

7:05 p.m. ET: (7) Missouri State vs. (2) Wichita State - The Shockers fell apart in the second half of February, losing all hope of an at-large invite to the NCAA Tournament. The drive for an automatic bid begins now for Coach Gregg Marshall's group, which needs to acquit itself well and regain some of the respect it lost over the past few weeks.

30 minutes after Missouri State-Wichita State: (6) Indiana State vs. (3) Illinois State - Osiris Eldridge and the rest of the Redbirds were left gutted and heartbroken at the end of last year's Arch Madness event against Northern Iowa. Now, the boys from Normal, Ill., will try to win the automatic bid that just barely eluded them 12 months ago. Expect Coach Tim Jankovich to have Illinois State ready to rock in the last quarterfinal of the day.

> Follw the entire 2010 Missouri Valley Conference Tournament here at MVC-fans.com

By: Matt Zemek
DFN Sports Staff Writer