| Raiders claim No. 3 seed in SBC tourney, opening bye |
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Posted: Sunday, February 28, 2010 7:59 pm
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Middle Tennessee clinched a share of the Sun Belt East Division title on Saturday night after defeating Florida Atlantic and will be the three seed in the Sun Belt Championships when play begins next weekend. (Bradley Lambert)
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NEW ORLEANS – Middle Tennessee clinched a share of the Sun Belt East Division title on Saturday night after defeating Florida Atlantic and will be the three seed in the Sun Belt Championships when play begins next weekend.
The Blue Raiders, Troy and North Texas ended the 2009-10 conference season in a three-way tie for first. Since Troy had the best head-to-head-record of the three it received the one seed in the tournament. North Texas received the two seed since it was the winner of the West Division with Middle Tennessee taking the three seed and the final bye in the tournament.
Middle Tennessee and North Texas are on the same side of the bracket but if both were to advance would not meet until the semi-finals on Monday, March 8.
With a first round bye, the Blue Raiders will not play until Sunday, March 7 when they will face the winner of Denver (6) and Florida International (11) in the quarterfinals at 9 p.m. The last time Middle Tennessee played Denver or FIU in the conference tournament was in 2005-06 when it lost in the first round to the Pioneers.
If Middle Tennessee were to play North Texas, it would be the second time in three years the two teams have met in the tournament. The Mean Green put Middle Tennessee out of the tournament last season in the quarterfinals.
North Texas will play the winner of UL-Lafayette (7) and Louisiana-Monroe (10) to round out the Blue Raiders’ side of the bracket. Middle Tennessee defeated Arkansas State last season in the first round of the tournament.
In the regular season, the Blue Raiders were 5-1 against their side of the bracket with two of those wins on the road. Middle Tennessee ended the season with a 7-1 road record in conference action and with 37 away victories has the most of any team in the Sun Belt since 2002-03 when Kermit Davis took the helm of Blue Raider basketball.
Chip Walters will have the call on all of the action in Hot Springs, Ark., and can be heard on the Blue Raider Network as well as on goblueraiders.com. Contact the Blue Raider ticket office at 1-888-YES-MTSU for tournament ticket booklets. More information on all of the scheduled events at the Sun Belt Championships in Hot Springs, Ark., may be found on the Sun Belt Conference website, www.sunbeltsports.org.
The complete bracket for the Sun Belt Championships and may be found on the championships page at www.sunbeltsports.org.
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