Wednesday’s Den: Mid-week musings…….

NCAA play-in games:
— Wagner 71, Howard 68
Wagner jumped out to a 21-10 lead, led 38-27 at halftime.
Seahawks advance to lose to North Carolina in their next game.
Wagner is 0-2 vs top 100 teams, losing by 21 to Seton Hall, by 34 to Providence.

— Colorado State 67, Virginia 42
Cavaliers shot 25% from floor, an ugly performance.
This is 7th time this season Virginia lost by 20+ points.
Rams shot 63.6% inside arc, led 27-14 at halftime.

Part of me thinks the four play-in games should be the last eight at-large teams; teams that win their conference tournament should get to play on Thursday/Friday, giving them a couple more days to enjoy the experience.

Another part of me thinks that the national TV exposure they get during the play-in games has to help their recruiting, so that is good, too.

NIT games:
— Ohio State 88, Cornell 83
Cornell was up 10 early, led 81-79 with 1:04 left.
Buckeyes were 13-22 on foul line, Cornell 5-6.

— Minnesota 73, Butler 72
Golden Gophers shot 57.1% inside the arc.
Butler led 70-67 with 1:24 left.

— South Florida 83, Central Florida 77
USF shot 13-24 on arc, led 49-35 at halftime.
Bulls have won 23 of their last 26 games. 

— Boston College 62, Providence 57
Eagles have won five of their last six games.
Three guys on Providence played 39 or 40 minutes.

— Georgia 78, Xavier 76
Dawgs led 65-42 with 13:25 left, then held on for dear life.
Georgia’s bench outscored Xavier’s, 35-7.

Word of the Day: Transition- a change from one state or condition to another.

Famous birthdays for March 20:
Pat Riley, 79
Rick Langford, 72
Steve McCatty, 70
Amy Aquino, 67
Kathy Ireland, 61
Mookie Blaylock, 57

— Abilene Christian 73, Texas A&M-Corpus Christi 63
Wildcats have won eight of their last 10 games.
Corpus Christi shot 2-24 on arc, 19-30 on foul line.

— Tarleton State 82, Texas Southern 71
Tarleton State put five players in double figures.
Texans have won 12 of their last 14 games.

— North Texas 84, LSU 77
Mean Green had lost 66-62 to LSU back in November.
North Texas shot 11-26 on the arc.

— Iowa 91, Kansas State 82
Payton Sandfort made 7-11 shots on the arc.
Iowa was 22-30 on foul line, K-State 8-16.

— Virginia Tech 74, Richmond 58
Spiders led 22-13 early on, then it went south on them.
Hokies have won four of their last five games.

— Utah 84, Cal-Irvine 75
Utes start four seniors; PG Smith had 13 points, 10 assists.
Utah hosts Iowa in its next game, Sunday.

— Kansas star Kevin McCullar is out of the NCAA Tournament with a bone bruise in his knee.

— Note of the Day: The last 36 NCAA Tournament teams that were seeded #1 or #2, who were unranked in the preseason top 25? None of those 36 teams made the Final Four. Iowa State falls into that category this year. 

Author: Armadillo Sports

I've been involved in sports my whole life, now just write about them. I like to travel, mostly to Las Vegas- they have gambling there.

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