Play-in Games and other Tourney Talk

By Dan Rodgers

Just to clarify, I don't think the play-in games are the first round. I think this is the play-in round and the first round starts Thursday. Also, I think it's stupid that random 14 and 12 seeds are forced to play an extra game to get to the actual tournament, but lower seeds don't have to. If you want to have play-in games, it should be all of the 16 seeds.

There are two play-in games tonight:

16 vs. 16 - Western Kentucky and Mississippi Valley State are currently in a battle, the winner gets to honor of getting destroyed by Kentucky in the first round. Western Kentucky is the first school with a losing record to make the tournament since 2009. It doesn't really matter because No. 1 seeds are 108-0 all-time in the first round, so why bother talking about it. -- WOW! This ended up being an exciting game as Western Kentucky went on a huge run to end the game.

12 vs. 12 - Unfortunately for BYU and Iona, the winner gets to lose to Marquette in the first round. This at least should be an entertaining game to watch, and it should be very high scoring. I expect BYU to win because I think they are just the better team; however, Iona might be playing with a chip on their shoulder since many experts are saying Iona didn't deserve to get an at-large bid.

The game I like the most tonight is in the NIT (aka Not In Tournament or National Invitational Tournament).

(6) LSU @ (3) Oregon -7.5 = I think this spread is way off. The Ducks have a damn good squad. They finished tied for second (with California) in the Pac-12 and lost in the conference tournament to eventual champion Colorado by one point (a week earlier Oregon beat Colorado by nine). LSU lost four out of their last five games and they don't do anything particularly well. I've seen Oregon play and they know how to fight and I just don't think that the Tigers can stick with them.