Arch Madness Begins!

Thursday’s First Round Games

(St. Louis, MO) – Happy Holidays! Arch Madness Begins! The revamped Missouri Valley Conference has eleven teams and ‘only’ three games in this year’s opening round. All the action gets started at 3:30 pm today.

Yesterday the league announced most of its annual awards. Regular season champion Belmont collected most of the hardware. Head coach Casey Alexander received the ‘Coach of the Year’ award and guard Tyler Lundblade is the ‘Larry Bird Player of the Year’ winner.

Joining Lundblade on the league’s all-conference team were Bradley’s Jaquan Johnson, Murray State center Fred King, leading scorer Jalen Quinn (Drake), Illinois State center Chase Walker and Lundblade’s teammate Drew Scharnowski.

King has been tabbed as the ‘Newcomer of the Year’ and his teammate Roman Domon is this year’s ‘Freshman of the Year’. Johnson added the conference’s top defensive player award and was the ‘captain’ of the most improved team. The rest of the MVC award notifications can be found here.

Arch Madness Begins

Game 1 – # 8 Southern Illinois (16-15, 10-10) v. # 9 Drake (12-19, 6-14)

SIU has won four straight games and six of its last seven and the Bulldogs have dropped nine straight, but anything can happen in this tournament. The teams split their regular season games, with each winning on their opponents home floor.

Drake’s Quinn led the league with a 19.8 points-per-game scoring average, but Eric Henderson’s team struggled to score. The Bulldogs finished tenth in the eleven-team league in all three shooting percentage categories. Sophomore wing Eli Shetland is the team’s top, three-point shooter, making 2.5 per game and connecting on 42 percent of his long distance attempts. Both are top ten numbers during league play.

SIU’s leading scorer Quel’Ron House (14.9 ppg) was named to the league’s second-team, all-conference team and to the Valley’s ‘all-newcomer team’. Rolyns Aligbe’s 7.6 rebounds per game were good for second in the league and seventh in steals and was named to the conference’s all-improved team.

SIU is riding an impressive defensive streak, holding its last seven opponents to 70 or fewer points. Only once did a team reach the 70-point level.

Game time is set for 3:30 pm.

Evening Action

Game 2 – # 7 Valparaiso (17-14, 11-9) v. # 10 Indiana State (11-20, 4-16)

Valpo has been playing its basketball, but lost its last game and Indiana State has had late season struggles but won their final contest. These Indiana rivals played two, tightly contested games with Valpo winning them both. The Beacons won in overtime in Terre Haute and by one point in Northwest Indiana.

Roger Powell Jr’s Valpo squad is 7-5 in conference games decided by six or fewer points. Indiana State is 2-7.

Two Beacon players are on the Valley’s ‘third-team’. Owen Dease and J.T. Pettigrew both finished in the top sixteen in the league scoring race and Pettigrew finished third in the rebounding race. The 6’8 Pettigrew is also on the MVC’s ‘all-freshmen’ team.

Guard Justus McNair received two, league-wide awards. The 6’3 sophomore is on the ‘all-bench’ and ‘most improved’ teams.

Sycamore forward Ian Scott was a bright spot. The 6’7 forward was tenth in scoring, seventh in rebounds and fourth in field goal percentage, but not named to any of the league’s postseason teams.

The Late Game

Game 3 – # 6 Northern Iowa (19-12, 11-9) v. # 11 Evansville (7-24, 3-17)

Ben Jacobson’s UNI Panthers were picked to finish second in the preseason poll and finished sixth. While missing forward Tristan Smith, the Panthers dropped five straight games. UNI was 17-6 with Smith in the lineup and 2-6 without him. He is not the team’s leading scorer, defender or rebounder, but he is the ‘X-Factor’ and he makes the Panthers a dangerous Arch Madness foe.

Senior Trey Campbell is on the league’s all-defensive team and is a second-team, all-conference selection. Leon Bond III is also one of the league’s top defenders. Big man, Will Hornseth emerged as one of the Valley’s most improved players.

It is criminal that Evansville’s Leif Moeller wasn’t named to the MVC’s all-freshman team. The 6’7 point guard was the league’s third leading rookie scorer, behind Murray State’s Roman Domon and Pettigrew and the top distributor. Evansville’s season never really got off the ground.

Big man Connor Turnbull missed most of the games and expected offensive contributor Keishon Porter missed virtually the entire campaign.

Enjoy it! Arch Madness Begins!