Tournament Play Starts Wednesday!!!

[panther2317]

I think for UNI, they will need to win out in the regular season to be considered for an at-large berth to the NCAA's. Therfore, the mentality for the team has to be that NCAA Tournament play starts tonight and it's a 3-game tourney with SIU, WSU and UNI. Each plays the other and the one with the most wins over the next 7 days has really set themselves up for well to take the next step to the NCAA's.

Once I get some free time this week, I am really start to look at records, conference and team rpi's to see if I can get a good feel (barring upsets in conference tourneys) how many at-large hopefuls are vying for the last 6 or 7 spots.

PTTB-you're good at this too...what teams does UNI cheer for? against? in the weeks to come? First, the Panthers need to take care of business on the court, which is possible, but a tough assignment, but after that, we need some help from teams also on the bubble.

Thoughts?

[AmesPanther]

I've heard PTTB talk about this, but I didn't follow all the possibilites. Too many "if this then this", but that was a week ago. Pretty soon things will settle down to where it's clearer what we want to happen with other teams.

[Panthers to the Bone]

Games in the next week:
Feb. 22 Indiana State at Drake (FOX) 7:05 PM---Gets Drake to 10 wins (all MVC teams have double digit wins)
Feb. 22 Evansville at Creighton (NETV / CSTV) 7:05 PM---Creighton needs to lose at least one game in this stretch

Feb. 23 SMS at Wichita State (MEDIACOM) 7:05 PM---It might knock WSU from an at-large bid, but moves UNI closer
Feb. 23 Northern Iowa at Southern Illinois (FOX) 7:05 PM--Panthers need to win
Feb. 23 Illinois State at Bradley (WEEK) 7:35 PM---ILSU needs to lose at least once

Feb. 26 Wichita State at Southern Illinois (FOX) 1:00 PM--SIU wins conference, and needs to win to bump WSU back more
Feb. 26 Bradley at Northern Iowa (HDNet-TV) 1:05 PM---Panthers need to take care of business on Senior Day
Feb. 26 Indiana State at Creighton Omaha, Neb. 1:05 PM---Again, we need CU to lose at least one (if not two)
Feb. 26 Evansville at Drake 4:05 PM---Doesn't matter
Feb. 26 Illinois State at SMS 7:05 PM---If SMS and IlSU both won the previous game, we want ILSU to win

Feb. 28 Southern Illinois at Indiana State (FOX) 6:00 PM---Just keep the ball rolling
Feb. 28 Drake at Bradley 7:05 PM---Gives Bradley a better RPI (which makes the Valley look good)
Feb. 28 Creighton at Illinois State 7:05 PM---Want ILSU to win b/c we have the tiebreaker with them
Feb. 28 SMS at Evansville 7:05 PM---SMS winning helps our RPI more b/c of winning twice against them...only need them to lose if they are tied with us.
Feb. 28 Northern Iowa at Wichita State (FOX) 8:00 PM---No need to explain myself

[GonzoCat]

Just thinking out loud here:

If UNI beats SIU and SMS beats WSU tomorrow, that puts us within a game of WSU and 2 games of SIU. In that case do we really care who wins between SIU and WSU saturday? Would we not even want WSU to win? Then if we beat Bradley we would be within 1 game of both of them. That gives us a chance to still win the conference regular season. We just have to take care of WSU and hope InSU can beat IlSU in the last game. I know we would have the tiebreaker over IlSU, and it's my understanding we have it over WSU also, or would that change if they beat IlSU? I suppose there are RPI based explanations of why this is a bad idea.

Anything is still possible and if we come down to the last game of the year with a chance to win the conference I like our chances.

[General_Panther]

I'm going to make this short and sweet, GO PANTHERS!!!!!