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The Arch Madness bracket is official

Y

yoda

Well-known member
We already knew it because there wasn't much chance the NET's were going to change that much, but
the official bracket was delayed until Monday morning's NET's were available.

Bradley plays 6pm Friday vs. the 6pm Thursday game winner between #7 seed Murray State/#10 seed Evansville


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The Bracket is official, and Bradley will play the winner of the Thursday game between # 7 seed Murray State and # 10 seed Evansville.

So out of my boredom while waiting for the MVC Tournament, here are a couple questions for Bradley fans-
1) which of those 2 teams would you rather face Friday, Murray State or Evansville?
2) If you could disregard the seeding, which of the other 11 MVC teams would you most prefer to play in Friday's quarterfinal match-up?

My answers-
1) It's a tough call. Both teams are near the bottom of the MVC in scoring/offense, FG%, and 3-point FG%. And neither team ranks high in rebounding or assists, either.
But I think I'd prefer to play Evansville over Murray State.
The Aces (8-12) limped into the tournament having lost their last 3 games, and 6 of their last 8.
Their record is 8-12, but their 8 wins were against Missouri State, SIU, ILSU, Valpo x 2, Murray, Belmont, and Indiana State. None of their wins were against a top-3 team, and only their win at Belmont was against a team above .500 in MVC play. They are not strong inside, though in the only match-up they had with Evansville, the Aces out-rebounded Bradley 45-28, and had more points-in-the-paint that the Braves, 30-22. But I think Bradley's superior shooting gives them the advantage.
Murray State (9-11) has only 1 more MVC win that Evansville, but they were capable of knocking off some good teams like Loyola, Drake (in Des Moines), and Northern Iowa (in Cedar Falls). And they took Bradley to overtime in Peoria on Feb. 25. So they seem a bit more dangerous than UE. And they could have a more fans in St. Louis than Evansville will.

2) If we could choose our opponent Friday, I'd probably go with SIU this season. Bradley beat them twice rather easily (by 23 & 14). They don't have much size or depth, and their outside shooting is questionable. I think Bradley matches up strongest against them, though it is close among these 4- SIU, Valpo, Indiana State, and Evansville.
One other thought- I'm glad the opponent isn't last place Missouri State (record 2-1 ). It would be a total embarrassment if Bradley were to lose to them. And despite Bradley beating them by 9 points in Springfield in their only match-up this season, They have nothing to lose and they have better shooting stats than any of the bottom 6 teams. And they have the talent and capability of upsetting someone if they get hot, despite their abysmal record.

Post your thoughts.
 
There are no guaranteed win games. Valpo beat Loyola, the number 1 seed a few years ago on Friday. A lot of their fans and cheerleaders were staying at the Residence Inn, where we were staying. They had a big banquet victory dinner planned at the hotel that night. Almost all of them left back to Chicago that night or early Saturday morning.
 
molar50 said:
There are no guaranteed win games. Valpo beat Loyola, the number 1 seed a few years ago on Friday. A lot of their fans and cheerleaders were staying at the Residence Inn, where we were staying. They had a big banquet victory dinner planned at the hotel that night. Almost all of them left back to Chicago that night or early Saturday morning.
Click to expand...

That was brutal (for Loyola).
Bradley has been relatively fortunate. Bradley has lost their share of games in the tournament, but usually to teams that were favored. Can anyone remember such an unexpected, brutal loss by Bradley in past years to a lower seed?
 
Coach, agree with your assessment 100%. Exactly how I feel about the bracket. Very glad that UNI has to play UIC (assuming they beat Valpo) so we don't have to play both of them.

My brother bet me $50 that Drake would get knocked out in Friday's game. I think he's nuts, but I can see them falling to ISU Red or Belmont. 3 games in 3 days will be brutal with the minutes their starters put in.
 
Outside of the top 4 plus ILSU, Murray is the only other team that I clearly want to avoid. They sit in 7th because they are inconsistent, but they have a lot of dog inside them when they want to. So for that reason I don't love our draw.

That leaves 6 teams that I barely see any clear differentiation between, when it comes to playing a 1 game clash. I guess I'd most like to face Evansville.

When "upsets" happen in this tournament, I don't think it will be as clear cut as normal. That should make each matchup a bit more interesting than usual.

If we can get this done, we will have to have earned it bc we're looking at a tough road. I hope the team is healthy coming in as I heard about some potential illnesses coming into last game.
 
Da Coach said:
That was brutal (for Loyola).
Bradley has been relatively fortunate. Bradley has lost their share of games in the tournament, but usually to teams that were favored. Can anyone remember such an unexpected, brutal loss by Bradley in past years to a lower seed?
Click to expand...

I believe Valpo got to the title game that year.
 
braves16 said:
I see that was in 2020.
Click to expand...

That was the most entertaining tournament of all time. I believe every lower seed won every game except for BU, who obviously went on to win the whole thing. Had dinner with the Valpo team at Sugarfire after that game! They were pretty nice guys and their coach was a class act. They were very cordial to us wearing our BU gear after losing in the finals.
 
Is next year an opportunity to enact the WCC approach to seeding Arch Madness? It protects the top seeds more and increases the likelihood that one of the top 2 finishers in the regular season goes to the NCAA tourney. However, it drags out the tournament to 6 days instead of the typical 4 - which could put a burden on some lower seeded teams and decrease the per session attendance in the first couple rounds. Or should we go back to the previous seeding structure used for AM?
 
Will be curious to see how next years' Arch Madness is structured since we'll have just 11 teams. I would think the top 5 have the Thursday bye with 6 vs 11, 7 vs 10 and 8 vs 9.
 
Yup, I agree. There really isn't any other logical way to do it with 11 teams.
If the conference stays at 11 teams, it does have the advantage of allowing the league to have a full round-robin schedule and stay at 20 league games. A lot of coaches and fans (me included) do not like the current unbalanced schedule

We haven't heard any updates recently from the MVC about what is being considered. Do they plan to push for the addition of a new 12th team after the season ends? Or are they satisfied to stay at 11 for next season and take more time to consider expansion?

The last comment that MVC Commissioner Jeff Jackson made was back in August, 2024, just after Missouri State announced they were leaving. He said the MVC would be in no hurry to replace them, and that "the league is prepared to move forwards with 11 schools". - https://kiwaradio.com/sports/mvc-commissioner-jeff-jackson-on-possibility-of-expansion/

PJ Star columnist Dave Eminian posted this column last August with comments from Commissioner Jeff Jackson, along with Coaches Brian Wardle, Casey Alexander, and Ben Jacobson- https://www.pjstar.com/story/sports...acobson-jeff-jackson-belmont-uni/74883827007/

Quote from Jeff Jackson-
"I don't think we feel any need to fill the spot. I don't think between myself and my board room — the presidents and chancellors who make the decisions on who we bring into the Valley — I don't think we feel the need to do anything or change anything in our approach to how we look at membership realignment."
 
I do think that is the only sensible bracket with 11 teams and a true round robin regular season is a positive. The only downside is that each day in the regular conference season one team has an off day.
 
I think I'd prefer to add another team for next season, despite the nice round robin schedule with 11 teams. If the MVC wants any shot at relativity going forward it should be doing everything possible to add a quality program or really, multiple programs to the conference going forward.
 
Stryker said:
I think I'd prefer to add another team for next season, despite the nice round robin schedule with 11 teams. If the MVC wants any shot at relativity going forward it should be doing everything possible to add a quality program or really, multiple programs to the conference going forward.
Click to expand...

We could always kick out an underperforming team
 
egib52 said:
We could always kick out an underperforming team
Click to expand...

That might do more good than adding another team, IMO. But it won't happen.
What mid-major program(s) would significantly improve the MVC and would want to join?
There would be no shortage of schools who would apply, but it would look like a list of Summit, Horizon, & OVC conference schools. There are a couple that might be OK, but I don't see any that would be great additions.
In the last 12 years, the MVC has added Loyola, Valparaiso, UIC, Belmont, and Murray State. After a few years of mediocrity, Loyola turned out good for the MVC. Belmont is a good choice for most sports, and is a terrific basketball program, even if they draw far less than 2,000 attendance. Murray State is OK, but the jury is still out on UIC.
And Valpo has been a major disappointment. I can't blame the MVC for trying with Valpo. They dominated the Horizon for many years before they switched. And the MVC felt like they needed to replace Loyola with a Chicago area school in 2017.
But, check their records - https://www.sports-reference.com/cbb/schools/valparaiso/men/
This is their 8th season in the MVC, and they have never had a winning conference record, and have played on Thursday in all 8 years in the tournament.
I hope things are on the upswing under Roger Powell, but, the MVC can't afford to add another perpetual loser.
 
I guess the no. 1 question would be who is interested and who is a good fit. I wish the Valley could add 3 decent teams which I would hope they would be more relevant moving forward.
 
tomahawk chop said:
I guess the no. 1 question would be who is interested and who is a good fit.
Click to expand...
There’s one school that wanted in each of the last couple times but it might affect our “pipeline”

personally, I don’t want them. They crossed the line some 20 yrs ago, cheating, tampering with our player, lied about it and their sleazy staff has gone on from then to commit even worse, sleazier violations- and I have a long enough memory that I can’t forget.
 
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