Special Thursday Edition
(St. Louis, MO) – Here we go! Arch Madness finally starts today. Four opening rounds on tap for today in downtown St. Louis! This is a special Thursday edition of Wednesdays in the Valley. I’m Harry Schroeder, editor of the site, ValleyHoopsInsider.com and the host of the show.
While the Bradley Braves are the favorites to defend their regular season title, there probably six teams that could give Brian Wardle’s team a run for their money. But it all starts with four opening round games today and tonight at Enterprise Center.
(Read BustingBrackets.com for my full preview of Arch Madness)
Day Time Games
The tournament tips at noon with a game between eighth seeded Northern Iowa (13-17, 9-11) and the ninth seeded Redbirds of Illinois State (11-20, 6-14). The Panthers swept the season series between the teams in two low scoring affairs.
UNI’s Bowen Born was named to the Valley’s all-conference, second team, while freshmen Michael Duax and Landon Wolf were also honored. Duax landed on the league’s all-freshman team and Wolf, was named to the MVC’s all-bench team.
UNI sophomore Tytan Anderson led the league in rebounding and was honored as the Valley’s ‘Most Improved Player’.
Bradley awaits the winner of this contest.
All the games today can be seen on MVC TV.
The 2:30 game finds fifth seeded Indiana State (20-11, 13-7) meeting 12th seeded Evansville. Indiana State may have been the ‘surprise team’ in the Valley, winning nine more games than last season and the Purple Aces struggled all season long. To make matters worse for the Aces, two key players Yacine Toumi and Antoine Smith were injured. Their status for today’s game will be a key factor in their ability to compete with the Sycamores.
Four of Indiana State’s starters received some kind of league-wide honor this week. The conference’s highest scoring team swept the Valley’s lowest scoring team this season. UE is shorthanded and INS is deep and versatile. It could be a long day at the office for David Ragland’s team.
Winning this contest earns an opportunity to play fourth seeded Belmont on Friday.
On a personal note, I’ll be announcing this game and the the follow up contest against Belmont for local St. Louis radio station, KTRS, The Big 550.
Night Time Games
Murray State (16-14, 11-9) and Valparaiso (11-20, 5-15) played two overtime games this season and the Racers won them both. Murray is the seven seed and the Beacons are number ten. Valpo’s Ben Krikke led the league in scoring and was named to the All-Valley firs team last night, while Murray State’s Rob Perry landed on the third team and the all-newcomer squad.
The winner of this 6:00 pm game faces Drake at the same time on Friday.
The night cap finds sixth seeded Missouri State (16-14, 12-8) and eleventh Illinois Chicago (12-19, 4-16). Stop me if this sounds familiar. The Bears swept the regular season games between these two teams.
Two of the league’s lowest scoring teams are coached by men that both mentored under former Illinois State head coach Dan Muller and are good friends. UIC’s Jace Carter and MO-State’s Donovan Clay were both named to the Valley’s second team, all-conference squad. Clay was also honored as one of the league’s top defenders. His teammate Chance Moore landed on the all-bench team.
How this game is officiated will have a significant bearing on the outcome. Getting tomorrow’s Wednesdays in the Valley posted early in the morning will be difficult.
Southern Illinois tangles with the winner on Friday.
The Big Awards
Conference champion coach Brian Wardle was named the Valley’s Coach of the Year and Drake’s Tucker DeVries received the Larry Bird – Most Outstanding Player Trophy. The other first teamers were SIU’s Marcus Domask, Bradley’s Rienk Mast, Roman Penn of Drake and Belmont’s Ben Sheppard.
Indiana State’s Courvoisier McCauley was named the top newcomer, while Belmont’s Cade Tyson earned the top freshman award. Bradley’s Malevy Leons was tapped as the ‘Defensive MVP’ and his Bradley teammate Ja’Shon Henry was named the conference’s ‘Sixth Man of the Year’.
We’ll be adding more ‘Wednesdays in the Valley’ throughout the weekend.
Four games today and four on Friday! Is this Heaven? No it’s Arch Madness!
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As we near the closing of the portal window, we've reached 1900. Some of them never to play college basketball again, earn a college degree and some to play at a much lower level than they did last season.
I guess we'll be seeing this in a @RacersHoops uniform this year. Glad AJ is staying in the @ValleyHoops.
