SI:AM | March Madness Tickets Punched

Good morning, I’m Dan Gartland. I feel really terrible for the Southern Indiana women’s basketball team. (More on that below.)

In today’s SI:AM:

???? Hi, Russ

???? Scuffle in the SEC title game

???? The Chiefs pursuit of a three-peat

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The dance card is filling up

Although Selection Sunday is still a week away, 12 teams have already earned spots in the men’s and women’s NCAA tournaments. Let’s take a look at a few of the most interesting.

South Carolina (women)

There was never any doubt that Dawn Staley’s team would be playing in March Madness, of course, but the Gamecocks’ pursuit of a perfect season was very much in question during the SEC tournament. First, senior Kamilla Cardoso hit a three-pointer at the buzzer—the first three of her career—to beat Tennessee in Saturday’s semifinal. Then, in yesterday’s final against LSU, South Carolina ground out a tough victory, 79–72, to claim its eighth conference tournament championship in the last 10 years. The headline, though, was the bench-clearing scuffle in the final minutes that saw 10 players ejected. That’s not how South Carolina wanted to end conference play, but it shows you the intensity of this rivalry.

USC (women)

The main reason the Trojans, ranked fifth in the latest AP poll, are among the best teams in the country is the play of star freshman JuJu Watkins. She went off for 33 points in Friday’s semifinal win over No. 7 UCLA. But she was terrible in yesterday’s championship game against No. 2 Stanford, scoring a season-low nine points on 2 of 15 shooting. And yet USC still won—rather handily, in fact, 74–61. Senior Harvard transfer McKenzie Forbes, second on the team with 13.5 points per game, erupted for 26. Rayah Marshall had 10 points and 18 rebounds, her seventh game this season with at least 15 boards. Watkins is the star, but the Trojans have enough talent around her to make them a serious title contender.

Drake (men)

The stakes were high in the Missouri Valley Conference championship game. Both Drake and Indiana State had become trendy picks to make noise in the NCAA tournament, but they needed to get there first. It was the Bulldogs who emerged victorious, 84–80, behind 27 points from Tucker DeVries, the son of coach Darian DeVries. Drake is the real deal, boasting wins over a Nevada team that should be tournament-bound and now two victories over the Sycamores. But Indiana State had an even better regular season and now must sweat it out until Selection Sunday to wait and see if it’ll earn a spot in the field. Its place in the NCAA’s NET rankings (No. 29) should be good enough to go dancing, but it’s hardly a guarantee. (Before yesterday’s game, Pat Forde made a compelling case for why the MVC should be a two-bid league this year.)

UT Martin (women)

This is a weird one. Southern Indiana breezed through the Ohio Valley Conference this season, going 17–1, and then stomped UT Martin in the final of the conference tournament, 81–53. But the Screaming Eagles won’t be going to the NCAA tournament because of a silly NCAA rule. This is the program’s second year of a four-year transition from Division II to Division I, rendering the school ineligible for postseason play. It’s the same rule that threatened to exclude the James Madison football team from a bowl game last season. So instead it’ll be UT Martin representing the OVC in March Madness. The Skyhawks went 16–16 this season and tied for second in the conference at 11–7.

The rest

• Iowa (women): Caitlin Clark ended her Big Ten career in style, with 34 points, 12 assists and seven rebounds in the Hawkeyes’ 94–89 overtime victory against Nebraska.
• Notre Dame (women): The Irish picked up an impressive victory over 10th-ranked NC State in the ACC title game.
• Richmond (women): The Spiders are 29–5 after beating Rhode Island in the Atlantic 10 title game.
• Presbyterian (women): The Blue Hose are going dancing for the first time in program history after stomping Radford in the Big South title game, 60–37. Presbyterian has smothered opponents all season long with a defense that averages just 58.5 points allowed per game, 53rd in the country.
• Chattanooga (women): Jada Guinn, a fifth-year senior transfer from Tennessee Tech, had 32 points in the Mocs’ win over UNC Greensboro in the SoCon tournament final. She had 33 in the semifinals against Mercer.
• Stetson (men): The Hatters clinched their first tournament bid in program history with a 94–91 win over Austin Peay yesterday. Jalen Blackmon had 43 points and is averaging 27 per game over his last six.
• Longwood (men): The Lancers went 6–10 in Big South play but knocked off top-seeded High Point in the semifinals, 80–79, in overtime and then trounced UNC Asheville in the final, 85–59.
• Morehead State (men): The Eagles beat UT Martin in the OVC title game behind 26 points from fifth-year senior Riley Minix. He’s the team’s leading scorer and rebounder this season, his first at Morehead State after spending four years at NAIA-affiliated Southeastern University in Florida.

The best of Sports Illustrated

• Pat Forde has more on Drake’s MVC title win and the loss of a family member that coach Darian DeVries and his son Tucker carried with them in St. Louis.
• Chris Jones’s record-setting contract is evidence that the Chiefs are pushing hard to win a third straight Super Bowl, Matt Verderame writes.
• PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan is set to address the media this week for the first time since August. Bob Harig wonders if he’ll have anything worthwhile to say about golf’s uncertain future.
• The Bears reportedly plan to commit $2 billion toward building a new domed stadium south of Soldier Field. No word on how much the project is expected to cost, though.
• Russell Wilson has found his next team. He reportedly plans to sign with the Steelers.
• In Florida quarterback news, the Jaguars are reportedly trading for Mac Jones and Baker Mayfield is staying in Tampa.
• Rockets big man Alperen Şengün, who’s having a breakout season in Houston, left the court in a wheelchair last night after injuring his leg.
• Jason Kelce isn’t the only Eagles stalwart calling it a career. Defensive tackle Fletcher Cox is retiring after 12 seasons in Philadelphia.

The top five...

… things I saw yesterday:

5. Connor McDavid’s interception and immediate goal just one minute into the Oilers’ win over the Penguins.

4. Another impressive block by Anthony Edwards. (Not as amazing as his game-winning block last week, but nothing is.)

3. Brandon Boston Jr.’s big dunk right in the face of both Giannis Antetokounmpo and Bobby Portis.

2. The Wild’s gutsy move to pull the goalie in overtime against the Predators. It worked perfectly, though, and Minnesota picked up an important win as it chases the last wild-card spot in the Western Conference.

1. Freddy Hicks’s game-winner at the buzzer for Arkansas State to knock off top-seeded Appalachian State in the Sun Belt semis.

SIQ

On this day in 1901, The Cincinnati Enquirer reported that which American League team was considering signing a Native American player named Tokohoma (who in reality was a Black baseball star named Charlie Grant)?

• Detroit Tigers
• Baltimore Orioles
• Philadelphia A’s
• Washington Senators

Friday’s SIQ: Which of the following schools was not part of the so-called “Catholic 7” when the Big East agreed on March 8, 2013, to allow its non-football members to use the name going forward?

• Marquette
• DePaul
• Xavier
• Providence

Answer: Xavier. The seven schools were DePaul, Georgetown, Marquette, Providence, St. John's, Seton Hall and Villanova. When numerous schools (including Notre Dame, Pittsburgh, Syracuse and Louisville) jumped to the ACC, the Big East was left with just three football-playing full members: UConn, Cincinnati and South Florida. Those schools were set to welcome several new members (mostly from Conference USA) to form a new league called the American Athletic Conference, and the football-playing members held the power to leave the basketball schools out in the cold.

That’s when the basketball-focused members took a major risk and paid $100 million for the rights to the Big East name and the ability to continue hosting the conference tournament at Madison Square Garden. It was a gamble that those seven small private schools would be able to form the basis of a conference able to generate enough interest to survive, but it worked. Big East teams have won three of the past 10 men’s basketball championships.

For more on how the Big East reinvented itself as a basketball-first powerhouse, read Pat Forde’s story from last year on the 10th anniversary of the conference’s split.