The matchups were announced today for the annual BracketBuster weekend, giving an additional game to help boost the mid- and low-major school profiles for the NCAA tournament. But in a season where Bradley's 13-9 record simply isn't good enough to get an at-large bid, the event doesn't carry as much excitement as usual.
Though the top teams often go all over the country in order to play the featured matchups, many of the games take location more into account than actual record or RPI. If the Braves hadn't already faced them in December, they probably would have gotten Milwaukee (111 RPI - realtimerpi.com). But instead, the Braves drew the next team down in the Horizon League - Loyola (12-11, 150 RPI).
Overall, this doesn't really look like a great draw. Loyola has a 4-7 record in the Horizon League, good for 6th out of 10 teams. For the most part, the Ramblers have beaten the bad teams on their schedule and lost to the rest. They did beat Wisconsin-Green Bay at home, who knocked off nationally-ranked Butler tonight.
But, from a selfish point of view, this is a great development. Now I will get a chance to likely see another Bradley game in person and only have to travel a short distance to get there. Local yokels may complain down in Peoria, but with the amount of alumni that live in the area, this is always a great fit. I'd expect the Bradley fans to be even louder than the Loyola fans, just like last season.
Thinking ahead, this game will also provide a good schedule filler for next season in Peoria. With all of the tough non-conference games planned (at Brigham Young, at Butler, possibly at Iowa State, the Las Vegas tournament with two games against Utah, Oklahoma State or Illinois), a game like this will help round out the schedule to not make it impossible. Sure, Bradley should be better next year with Andrew Warren and Will Egolf returning from injury, but they still will need some easier opponents, too.
So, all you Chicago alumni get excited as the Braves are returning to Chicago. Hopefully they can take care of Loyola, who Bradley should be able to beat.
Other MVC games:
Northern Iowa at Siena
Illinois State at Niagara
George Mason at Creighton
Miami (OH) at Evansville
Austin Peay at Drake
Southern Illinois at Illinois Chicago
Cleveland State at Wichita State
Toledo at Indiana State
Missouri State at Tennessee-Martin
No comments:
Post a Comment