The first team to qualify for the NCAA tournament is...

[tornado]

about to be decided --
It will be the winner of this A-Sun championship game between Mercer & Florida Gulf Coast University ..

FGCU is a fairly new D-I and is seeking their very first basketball NCAA appearance..and they lead at half..

http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/basketball/boxscore?gid=201303090350

http://www.sbnation.com/college-basketball/2013/3/9/4082884/atlantic-sun-conference-2013-basketball-tournament-schedule-bracket-saturday-mercer-fgcu

[Da Coach]

Florida Gulf Coast wins the Atlantic Sun Conference tournament and gets an automatic NCAA tournament bid. Congratulations to Ken Kavanagh, who in just 3 years has engineered FGCU from an irrelevant D1 school and bottom dweller in their conference to a conference championship and an NCAA qualifier. They easily beat Mercer in the championship game played on Mercer's home court.

3 years ago when Ken got there, FGCU was coming off an 8-21 season and an RPI of 321. Now 3 years later, after improvement each season, they are 24-10, with an RPI of around 100.

http://scores.espn.go.com/ncb/boxscore?gameId=330682382

[tornado]

Wow - an impressive 88-75 win over top seeded Mercer on Mercer's home floor to grab the very first bid to the NCAA Tournament..
Congrats to Andy Enfield & all the staff at FGCU...

[AE Braves Fan]

Wow! Congrats Ken!

[Canton BU fan]

2nd and 3rd round tickets for 2014 tournament tickets go on sale Saturday. The Missouri Valley is host and already have been selling tickets in a presale. I have mine. PM me if you want the presale code. Anyone else going?