RTC Aftermath will come to you each night where our correspondents are at the conference tournament games as a part of RTC Live.  Michael Vernetti is in Las Vegas all weekend covering the WCC Tournament for RTC.  RTC Live was onsite Friday through Monday, concluding tonight in the Gonzaga vs. St. Mary’s Championship Game.

It was a Gonzaga party in the WCC championship game as the Zags continued a tournament blitz with an 83-58 victory over Saint Mary’s. Gonzaga featured balanced scoring with five players scoring in double figures, led by Josh Heytvelt’s 17 points. Matt Bouldin played another all-around excellent game, scoring 14 points and handing out 7 assists with no turnovers. Other big contributors for Gonzaga were Steven Gray and Jeremy Pargo.

Matt Bouldin Was Tremendous All Weekend

Saint Mary’s returned-from-injury guard Patty Mills was ineffective in his second game back after suffering a broken hand in a Jan. 29 game against Gonzaga. Mills, showing the rust from his long layoff, went just 2-16 for 5 points and sat out much of the second half. Diamon Simpson and Omar Samhan led the Gaels with 17 points each. Samhan also pulled down 9 boards for the Gaels and Simpson grabbed 6.

Gonzaga dominated the all-tournament team, placing guards Pargo and Bouldin, along with forward Micah Downs, who was voted tourney MVP. The rest of the all-star group included Saint Mary’s forward Simpson and Santa Clara center John Bryant. With the tournament championship, Gonzaga won an automatic bid to the upcoming NCAA championships, where they are hoping to ride their strong performance in Las Vegas to a high seed. Saint Mary’s will have to await the Selection Committee’s decision next Sunday, March 15 to see if they get an at-large bid.

RTC Aftermath will come to you each night where our correspondents are at the conference tournament games as a part of RTC Live.  Michael Vernetti is in Las Vegas all weekend covering the WCC Tournament for RTC.  RTC Live will be there on Monday night as Gonzaga-St. Mary’s Part III occurs.

Gonzaga had five players in double figures – led by Austin Daye’s 28 points – to crush Santa Clara 94-59 in tonight’s first semifinal game of the West Coast Conference tournament. The Zags got 18 from Micah Downs, 16 from Jeremy Pargo, 12 from Steven Gray and 11 from Matt Bouldin to totally dominate the Broncos.

Santa Clara’s stellar post man John Bryant eked out another of his patented double-doubles – 13 points and 12 rebounds – but it was not nearly enough to slow down the Zags. Bronco freshman James Rahon scored 20 points on 8-15 FG shooting to pace his team, which did not even slightly resemble the team that beat San Diego the night before.  With the win, Gonzaga advanced to tomorrow’s championship game against  Saint Mary’s, who defeated Portland 71-61.

Saint Mary’s benefited from the return to its lineup of point guard Patty Mills, who had missed all of February with broken bones in his shooting hand. Mills had 12 points and energized the Gaels on offense and defense. Saint Mary’s featured balanced scoring, with three players in double figures. Omar Samhan notched a double-double, with 12 points and 13 rebounds, while Samhan’s front court mate Diamon Simpson chipped in with 14 boards and 15 points of his own.  Portland was led by guard Nik Raivio with 15 points.

RTC Aftermath will come to you each night where our correspondents are at the conference tournament games as a part of RTC Live.  Patrick Marshall was in St. Louis all weekend covering the MVC Tournament for RTC.

First off, I would like to apologize to Rush the Court and Rush the Court fans that due to a family issue, we were not able to do an RTC Live event for the Missouri Valley Conference Final as expected.

UNI: MVC Champs (photo credit: WCFCourier.com)

Northern Iowa is the Missouri Valley Conference Tournament champion and punched their ticket to the NCAA tournament today defeating Illinois St. in overtime 60-57.  Northern Iowa was on fire early and took  a 27-19 lead into the locker room at halftime.   Illinois St. was only shooting 23% at halftime and almost looked like they were going to suffer the same fate they handed to Creighton the night before.

However, Illinois St. came out in the second half with a run to quickly tie the game behind Osiris Eldridge who scored all 21 of his points after halftime.  The game then went back and forth the rest of the way with Eldridge hitting some 3-pointers that were way behind the line including one that was almost literally at half court.  It looked like Illinois St.’s game to win, but the Panthers from UNI stormed back to force the game into overtime.

In the overtime, UNI’s Ali Farokhmenesh once again hit 2 key three pointers and free throws at the end to get UNI to the victory.  He finished with 13 points on 4-5 shooting and 3-4 from three.  Kwadzo Ahelegbe led UNI with 17 points as the other Panther in double figures.

The things that stuck out in the game were that Illinois St. was able to put up 63 shots while Northern Iowa only put up 46.  For the game, Illinois St. was held to 30% shooting which was totally opposite from the night before.  So as Northern Iowa is celebrating with their 23-10 record and the MVC tournament championship, let’s see how other teams from the Valley might fare in the postseason:

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Ryan Kish liveblogged the ODU-Hofstra game today, although the Richmond Arena is having technical issues with their wifi access, so we’re not sure if we’ll get another chance to liveblog tomorrow. If things are working ok, we’ll havee the VCU-ODU game for you at 3pm EST.

Quarterfinals

• VCU 61 Georgia State 52.  VCU got a little sloppy in this one but Eric Maynor did what he had to do to get the Rams the victory. ODU will be a difficult match up for them.
• Old Dominion 52, Hofstra 51.  Gerald Lee had an MVP performance dropping 30, but Hofstra almost stole the show with the excellent play by Charles Jenkins. Watching Jenkins and Lee trade baskets at the end made this one fun to watch.
• George Mason 61, James Madison 53.  Patriots again used a balance attack and excellent defense down the stretch to get this victory. JMU was a worthy opponent but the Patriots just seem like they wanted it more.
• Towson 58, Northeastern 54.  Towson again pulls off the upset. The #11 seeded Tigers won only five conference games all season but have used great defense to make it this far in the tournament. Northeastern just was not on their game and may have taken the Tigers for granted.  Tigers are confident and playing like they have nothing to lose because, well, they don’t.

Semifinals (Sunday)

• VCU vs. Old Dominion – 3pm
• George Mason vs. Towson – 5:30pm

RTC Aftermath will come to you each night where our correspondents are at the conference tournament games as a part of RTC Live.  Patrick Marshall is in St. Louis all weekend covering the MVC Tournament for RTC.

RTC Live Aftermath—Missouri Valley Conference Tournament, March 7, 2009

Today’s Missouri Valley Conference tournament game between Creighton and Illinois State was covered by Rush the Court. Illinois State dominated Creighton from the start and won 73-49 to advance to the finals of the Missouri Valley Conference Tournament.

Tournament officials decided to do something a little different than what was done in Thursday or Friday’s games for the starting lineups as they dimmed the lights and spotlighted the players.

Illinois State came out on fire and did not let up. They shot 55% from the field and 68% from the three point line (13/19) while Creighton shot only 27% from the field and 18% from the three point line. The Creighton huddle was befuddled by what Illinois State was doing.

In all reality though, the biggest issue was the shooting and making scoring plays. Illinois State had 16 assists on 28 baskets so they were getting great ball movement which gave them open shots. Creighton actually won battle of rebounds 39-35 (including 20 offensive rebounds) and made more free throws than Illinois State. Steals and turnovers were also basically even.

Creighton’s dance team tried to get the Jays going, but was unsuccessful.

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RTC Aftermath will come to you each night where our correspondents are at the conference tournament games as a part of RTC Live. Michael Vernetti is in Las Vegas all weekend covering the WCC Tournament for RTC.

San Diego, riding strong performances from its front court tandem of Gyno Pomare (18 points) and Roberto Mafra (14 points) toppled Loyola 62-56 to move into tomorrow’s quarterfinal game with Santa Clara. Mafra, notching his career high, and Pomare teamed up to overshadow a strong performance by Loyola freshman Kevin Young, who scored a career-high 20 points and grabbed eight rebounds.  RTC Live was there covering this game.

In tonight’s second game, Pepperdine prevailed 93-85 over San Francisco in a freewheeling affair featuring strong performances by Dior Lowhorn of USF (32 points) and Mike Hornbuckle (25 points) of Pepperdine. The Waves advance to play Portland on Saturday night following the conclusion of the San Diego-Santa Clara game beginning at 6 p.m.

RTC Live will be covering the San Diego vs. Santa Clara game at 6pm Saturday evening.  Stop by and leave your questions and comments.

RTC Aftermath will come to you each night where our correspondents are at the conference tournament games as a part of RTC Live.  Patrick Marshall is in St. Louis all weekend covering the MVC Tournament for RTC.

Today you experienced our live blog of the Bradley-Southern Illinois game in the quarterfinal round of the MVC tournament.  This game was up and down for both teams.    Both teams were ready to go:

Bradley won this game by hitting timely shots and wearing out the Salukis.  The Salukis shot only 35% from the field and Kevin Dillard, one of SIU’s bigger scorers was held scoreless in playing all 40 minutes of the game.

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I’m assuming that most of you got a chance to see this game unlike the last RTC Live when Providence knocked off #1 Pittsburgh. As a result this RTC Aftermath will not be quite as extensive as our first edition, but what we lack in length we will make up for in quality.

This was my first trip to Storrs, Connecticut and I have to say that I was surprised at how small the town is. I’m not sure if I missed the town center coming off of I-84, but it’s easily the smallest town for any state school that I have visited. The campus itself is pretty nice even if it lacks the uniqueness of some other campuses I have visited on this year’s RTC Live tour. Gampel Pavilion is a relatively nondescript building much like the other places we have visited this year with the except of UNC with the Dean Smith Center. Interestingly, the Huskies split their home games between Gampel and the XL Center in Hartford. While the XL Center seats more fans (16,294 compared to 10,167 in Gampel), the students seemed almost unanimous in agreement that they prefer the atmosphere when the games are held at Gampel. The one complaint they did have about Gampel was the lack of student seating. From what we were told (and my eyes seemed to confirm it), students are confined to a small section behind one basket and in the upper level behind another basket. Most of the students would have preferred to have been situated along the sidelines to make the atmosphere more imposing for visiting teams similar to Cameron Indoor at Duke as much as the students hated to say it. I’m not sure how the boosters seated along the sidelines would react to the proposition, but it is an interesting idea.

Pre-Game: For the second game in a row, we were there for a team’s Senior Night. Or was it Senior Day this time since the opening tip was at 2 PM? While the Huskies did not have as many seniors as Providence did, the scene was no less emotional as the fans were particularly excited for two players: A.J. Price, who has battled personal problems (he was the other guy in the Marcus Williams computer theft case) as well as medical problems (radiosurgery for an arteriovenous malformation and ACL surgery), and Jeff Adrien, the team’s physical inside presence and fan favorite for his interaction with the student section before and after games. As an added bonus, Jim Calhoun was honored for winning his 800th game (on Wednesday at Marquette). The student section was given cardboard Calhoun faces (think PTI’s Role Play) and they unveiled a banner celebrating the fact his 800th win although there were some technical difficulties when they tried to unveil the banner.

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Normally, I would assume that most of you have seen the #1 team in the country getting knocked off, but thanks to some horrible TV scheduling only 2% (all numbers are estimates) of college basketball fans ended up seeing Providence beat Pittsburgh at the Dunkin’ Donuts Center (DDC) on Senior Night. While the 11,187 in attendance and a few fortunate television viewers were able to witness what makes college basketball our favorite sport, we know that many of you were less fortunate. That’s where RTC Aftermath comes in. As part of our RTC Live coverage we answer questions from fans and also bring those questions to the players and coaches to answer. Last night, we were at the DDC for the fourth installment of RTC Live. Our first three games (Wake Forest at Boston College, Miami at UNC, and Clemson at Boston College) were all solid games, but I don’t think any of them would qualify as memorable games from a pure basketball standpoint. Being in the Dean Smith Center for an ESPN GameDay was a fun experience, but nothing like last night.

Pre-Game: The Friar fans (at least the ones in the student section) got there pretty early. The Friar fans were a lot more intense than I expected, but looking back on it I seem to remember some PC grads telling me that their student section was pretty crazy. I think they were even more amped up than usual though because they were facing the #1 team in the country (even if the SportsTicker fax at the game still had them at #4) and it was Senior Night (something I wasn’t aware of until they started the ceremony). After the ceremony, which went on for quite a long time (8 seniors), the Friars and their fans made it clear pretty early that they weren’t going to go quietly on Senior Night.

First Half: As I mentioned in last night’s After the Buzzer, the Friars got out to a quick start jumping out to a 15-4 lead after the first 5 minutes. The primary reason that they were able to do this was  a strong opening 5 minutes by Jonathan Kale, who scored 6 points on 3/3 FG to open the game, and their ability to force Pitt into 5 turnovers that they converted into 9 points during that stretch. The Panthers were able to cut the lead to 6 with 5:01 left in the first half thanks to Ashton Gibbs who hit two 3-pointers, but the Friars then proceeded to blow the game open with 13-1 run to close the first half. At that point, the crowd and Rush the Court (who had thought that it might have been a mistake to travel over an hour down to Providence as opposed to 15 minutes down Commonwealth Avenue to the FSU–Boston College game) began to sense that something special might be happening at the “Dunk”.

Second Half: Pitt was able to cut into the Providence lead (up to 20 just 17 seconds into the 2nd half) getting it down to a 10-point game with 13:50 left in the game. The Panthers were able recover from the awful ball-handing (at the 15:26 mark of the 2nd half they have 5 assists and 12 turnovers compared to Providence with 14 assists and 3 turnovers) and seemed to have the momentum, but that quickly changed with a little over 10 minutes remaining in the game when DeJuan Blair picked up his 3rd and 4th fouls in a 17-second span that sent the Friar fans into a frenzy. With the low-post player that they couldn’t match-up with out of the game, Providence was able to get the lead back to 17 with 6:30 remaining. The Panthers were able to mount a furious comeback that nearly silenced the rabid Friar fans after Blair tipped in an Ashton Gibbs miss to make it a 5-point game with 50 seconds remaining. The Friars managed to hold them off despite not making a field goal in the last 4:21 of the game thanks to a lot of trips to the free throw line (18-of-25 in the 2nd half).

Rushing the Court
When you name your blog “Rush the Court”, you are expected to stay there (and possibly join in) when the fans rush the court. We managed to do just that (the only media entity to not run in fear, much less join in). Some of the better pictures are below (try rushing the court with a laptop in your hands sometime). If you have some pics, send them into rushthecourt@gmail.com.

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