Selection Show Eve

By Allan Lewis – Alestle Sports Editor

As the earth randomly reaches a paradox creating an impulse to change our clocks ahead an hour, a page also turns on the college basketball season, and chapter three begins to unfold.

Tomorrow, the NCAA selection committee crawls out of its cave and tells the world which schools will be dancing.

The most exciting hour we spend annually with Greg Gumbel will be here before you know it, as the NCAA’s corporate sponsors tell us what is up.

I love it.

Tonight, in Orem, Utah, a different feeling of March Madness took place, one where a team SIUE is very familiar with became a champion. The University of South Dakota defeated Houston Baptist to stake claim to the Great West Conference title, and an automatic bid into the CollegeInsider.com Tournament.

Now, there is nothing innately special about the CIT, but for USD, it is a big stepping stone at the base of its transition. The Coyotes and SIUE are connected at the hip in joining the D-I ranks. Both teams started the long five year process in 2007, but took different routes. USD started with a more experienced team, while SIUE started with a young core. Last season, SIUE had one senior; John Edmison. this year it was four, but Aamir McCleary will be the only one with hard to replace numbers. The Coyotes, at 22-9 will graduate their two top players after this season, in Steve Smith and Tyler Cain.

While SIUE ended their year abruptly at 5-23 and as a probationary member of the Ohio Valley Conference, USD parted from the traditional field of teams competing as independents to join the Great West; a conference also in a transition stage.

Unlike the other 32 conferences, there is no automatic bid into the NCAA tournament at stake in the Great West, and there will not be for some time. What started as a football-only conference expanded to include all sports in 2008, and to become a home for the homeless.

There is really no time-line in place for the NCAA to grant the Great West a bid into it’s tournament, or fully recognize it for what it is, a D-I conference. For the schools competing in it, everyone from Cal-Poly to Chicago State to NJIT and all three of SIUE’s transitional counterparts, USD, North Dakota and Seattle it allows these Independents a small glimmer of post-season aspirations being fulfilled.

This is the very reason South Dakota joined the Great West. It gave them something to play for this season, and they made the most out of it. I am not alluding to any notion of SIUE having affiliation with such a conference, having joined the OVC, and having a secure home once it is primed and ready to compete for the dance. South Dakota’s Great West title just gives me that little feeling of “man, that would have been nice,” as the case probably should be.

South Dakota will be leaving the Great West after a short stay to join the Summit League and come back to the same level as SIUE next season.

One more Independent year, one year to taste the conference and then game time.

Personally, I will admit, the OVC is not my conference of choice for SIUE, and I would have preferred the Summit League, to rejoin an old rival in IPFW, as well as regional competition like Western Illinois, IUPUI, Oakland and UMKC. It just makes a little more sense to me for a Midwest school to play in a true Midwest league rather than the deep-southern roots of the OVC.

I realize the OVC has teams like SEMO, Eastern Illinois and even Murray State with similar academic and geographical profiles, but my trip to Nashville kind of made me wonder where we fit into the OVC landscape.

Who knows, a few years down the road the Missouri Valley may be calling for expansion, and I’m sure Saint Louis University and a more established SIUE program would be at the top of the list. Some post-season play this year would have been fun, but that’s what the next week and CBS is here for. To keep us occupied for the time being.

That’s all of my random thinking for now, sure to be more tomorrow when the bracket is unveiled, on the NCAA’s website they have a really cool Selection Committee game you can play, so consider this bracketology with me. The only problem with this, and it is something I am willing to admit: this season I have only really watched mid major basketball. It’s kind of shocking, but I only know who John Wall is because ESPN tells me. I don’t care. You want to know what I think about Wofford? sure, I can tell ya. Kentucky? no chance.

In fact, here is a story from the OVC tournament in Nashville. I was live-tweeting the championship game, and these punk Morehead State fans behind me were heckling me in deep southern accents (maybe the reason I don’t like the OVC?) “Hey, how’s Calipari’s twitter looking?” Me: I don’t know. Them: Calipari is the biggest Tweeter of all time!” Me: Wouldn’t know.”

They probably thought I was a moron and have apparently never heard of this thing called “new media” and live tweeting college basketball, but truth of the matter is, in general, I probably know more about college hoops than them. In fact, I know I do.

😉

So, just for fun, this is what my bracketology looks like right now, notice how Witchita State makes my cut and Illinois does not. Poetic justice for Lunardi, Billy Packer and the whole lot of big conference robots out there.

It’s harder than it looks.

-Allan.