Heading into the homestretch of the regular season. Some nuggets to gnaw on:We got to see JMU up close on Sunday, an impressive, well-balanced show over Delaware. But even if these Dukes win out, the loss at Drexel last week likely wrecked their chances to receive the top seed in the CAA Tournament. If both teams win out, they’ll be tied atop the league standings, having split with each other and both falling to third place Elon once. That leaves final regular-season RPI as the tiebreaker, and while the complex mathematical formula is beyond our liberal arts minds, here’s the lowdown. Drexel is 47, 20 spots ahead of JMU. Like we said, numbers can change, again, if both teams win out, that likely leaves the Dragons hosting the CAA Tournament in their own building as the No. 1 seed, a nice reward for a team picked to finish fourth in preseason. While we’re admittedly not the best number crunchers, we suspect the Dukes were hurt in the RPI by a 73-66 home loss on Nov. 19 to St. Joseph’s. If the Dukes end up as the No. 2 seed, that likely means a semifinal date with defending league champ Elon.
Drexel’s lone CAA title was in 2009 when the Dragons stopped Old Dominion’s streak of 17 consecutive titles.
Charlie Creme’s last bracketology pencils Virginia in the national tournament for the first time ever under coach Joanne Boyle, but is it a given? After dropping five of their last seven games, these Cavaliers now find themselves with a fairly similar resume to last year’s team that was among the first four out. A year ago, for example, Virginia took an 18-11 record into the ACC Tournament; this year, the Cavaliers head to Greensboro with a 17-12 mark. And while this year’s Cavs have played a significantly tougher schedule, both teams managed just one RPI Top-25 win. A key difference is that this year’s Cavs also have an RPI Top-50 win (Syracuse) and could wind up with another if Indiana (RPI 53) can make some noise in the Big Ten Tournament. If the Cavs had produced comparable wins last year, they probably would have made the NCAA cut. The 2017-18 Cavaliers also boast an RPI of 34, much better than the No. 53 rating last year’s Cavs carried into Selection Monday.
Of course, Virginia could eliminate a lot of the suspense by coming up big in this week’s conference tournament. The seventh-seeded Cavaliers will open against either No. 15 Clemson or No. 10 Georgia Tech in Wednesday’s second round, with the winner to meet No. 2 Notre Dame in the quarterfinals the following day..
Elsewhere in the ACC tourney, No. 9 Virginia Tech meets No. 8 Syracuse in Wednesday’s second round, with top-seeded Louisville waiting in the quarters. The Hokies are 6-10 in the ACC, a two-game improvement from last season, and they defeated the Orange 73-64 on Feb. 1, However, Chanette Hicks scored 18 with two assists in that game. A week later, the point guard left the program to attend to a personal matter and she has not returned.
No. 4 George Mason, which finished fourth in the Atlantic 10 standings, will look to continue making program history when it hosts 13th-seeded St. Bonaventure Tuesday in the first round of the conference tournament. Saturday’s 65-55 decision over LaSalle was the Patriots’ program-record 22nd victory, and the fourth-place finish was Mason’s highest in league play since 2003-04. But while it’s hard to overstate the efforts of a team that has accomplished so much. we do want to add an “ahem” to the Patriots hosting a conference tournament game for the first time in 12 years as noted on Twitter and elsewhere. The A-10 only returned to the format of allowing 3 through 8 to host first-round games last season. The Patriots didn’t join the conference until 2013. They were previously in the CAA, which did not follow that format. That said, beware of these Patriots, which fell by just five points at top-seeded Dayton on Feb. 21. George Mason also lost to Fordham by five and to Duquesne by seven. They are at the very least a shoo-in for the WNIT.
BTW, does anyone doubt Natalie Butler is POY in the league? The nation’s leading rebounder is also the nation’s leader in double-doubles with 29, and to us, an easy selection for All-American. Nicole Cardano-Hillary is surely conference freshman of the year, too.
Also in the A-10, No. 9 Davidson is at No. 8 Richmond on Tuesday, and No. 11 VCU is at No. 6 VCU. The Spiders, winners of four of their last five, lost to Davidson 68-65 in their lone meeting this season. The Rams split with the Hawks, losing 79-41 on Dec. 31 before beating St. Joseph’s 56-54 a month later.