Bracketologists can't ignore Racers anymore
WBB: One win from the NCAA Tournament, Murray State is finally getting attention
With just two teams left standing in the Missouri Valley Conference Tournament, Murray State is now getting the “automatic qualifier” tag when NCAA Tournament bracketologists put together their brackets ahead of tomorrow’s official bracket release.
For those of you who don’t want to put the cart in front of the horse — Rechelle Turner, I’m looking at you! — just X out of this story and pretend it never happened.
But if you want to take a peek at what could potentially be out there for Murray State in the NCAA Tournament, IF they’re able to take care of business against Belmont on Sunday in the tournament championship game, allow me to catch you up on the latest in bracketology.
Over at ESPN, the Racers are currently listed as a #11-seed, and they would face #6-seed Michigan State in Norman, Oklahoma. The winner of that game would face the winner of #3-seed Oklahoma and #14-seed San Diego State.
At HerHoopStats.com, the Racers are a #12-seed facing off with #5-seed Tennessee in Columbus, Ohio. The other half of the bracket has #4-seed Ohio State hosting #13-seed Green Bay.
As you may have noticed, in the women’s tournament, the Top 16 seeds host a four team section of the bracket. Depending where the Racers would end up being seeded, barring an upset, they would at some point play a true road game in either their first or second game — if they were able to get to a second game.
CBS Sports doesn’t have a bracket, and hasn’t updated their information since Tuesday, but they do have Murray State listed as a #12-seed.
All of this is moot, if the Racers don’t beat Belmont on Sunday. What we can obviously see is Murray State, if they can get to the NCAA Tournament, would likely be a #11-seed or #12-seed. For folks hoping to see the Racers play closer to home, here are the 16 teams, in no particular order, ESPN currently has listed as the top seeds that would host the opening two rounds: South Carolina, UCLA, Ohio State, Baylor, Duke, TCU, LSU, Notre Dame, Texas, North Carolina, USC, Ole Miss, Kentucky, UConn, Oklahoma and NC State.
Geographically, Kentucky and Ole Miss are probably the two best possibilities, but that will ultimately be up to the selection committee.
First things first — Murray State needs to beat Belmont at 1:00pm on Sunday. Then at 7:00pm on Sunday night, the NCAA Tournament Selection Show will unveil the 68 teams that have made the Big Dance.