Conference Tournaments Starting on March 10th

(Pitt Panthers - 2008 Big East Conference Tournament Champions)

Four Conference Tournaments begin on Tuesday...four more brackets for me to fill out. My vision is starting to blur from this insanity, and I still have 11 more to do after today. The biggest tournament beginning today is the Big East. This tournament has expanded to all 16 teams this year, which means that games start on Tuesday, the top four teams get byes until Thursday, and the teams ranked 9th - 16th would have to win 5 games in 5 games to win it all. It's gonna be a difficult feat for the Fighting Irish to pull off. As always, my predicted champions are in bold.

• Big East Conference - Pittsburgh - Look...this might be Pitt's year. And by "year", I mean the season where I finally see them reach the Elite Eight. I gotta go with them to win the Big East. The Panthers have reached 6 of the past 7 Big East Championship games. They love New York. Obviously, this isn't the tournament of highest priority for Pitt...but it would be great to see them dominate their league once more before getting to the Big Dance. Villanova, Marquette, and Syracuse could be dangerous here...but I'm going with P-I-T-T to cut down the nets in Madison Square Garden. Notable Seeds: #1 Louisville, #2 Pittsburgh (props to Chris T.), #3 Connecticut, #4 Villanova (props to Matt), #5 Marquette, #6 Syracuse, #7 West Virginia (props to Chelsea), #10 Notre Dame (props to the WHOLE South Bend crew!), #12 Georgetown, #15 Rutgers (props to Rob)

• Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference - Morgan State - Although Morgan State is HANDS DOWN the best team in this conference...any team could come away with the title. Coppin State won the automatic bid last season as the 7th seed, sporting a 13-20 record going into the MEAC Tournament. Choosing a winner of this league is sort of like playing in one of those NFL "numbers" pools where one picks a bunch of random numbers off a grid. The only way to win, is to win randomly. Picking the MEAC Champion is just like gambling on the Pierogi races during Pirates games...there is no rhyme or reason as to who will win, but betting on it sure makes a lot of fun. Notable Seeds: #1 Morgan State, #2 South Carolina State, #3 Norfolk State, #4 North Carolina A&T, #5 Coppin State, #6 Bethune-Cookman, #9 Howard

• Mid-American Conference (MAC) - Buffalo - Nobody stood out in this conference all season. There are no "sexy" teams in the league this year...such as the Kent State team with current NFL tight end Antonio Gates that upset Pitt a few years back or those Miami (OH) teams with Wally Szczerbiak. Bowling Green is the #1 seed in this tournament but that's only because there was essentially a five-way tie for "first" in the MAC. I'm going with Buffalo because they have the highest RPI of any team and they've NEVER been to the NCAA Tournament. Their nickname is the Bulls by the way. Notable Seeds: #1 Bowling Green, #2 Ball State, #3 Buffalo, #4 Miami (OH) (props to Dave and Kathryn), #5 Akron (props to Kim), #6 Kent State, #9 Ohio

• Western Athletic Conference (WAC) - Utah State - I'm too tired so I'll make this short. Nobody matters here except Utah State and Nevada. My reasons for picking the winner are based on at LEAST two minutes of research. Utah State has a RPI of 27...that's better than UCLA, Marquette, and Gonzaga. They went 14-2 in the WAC with a record of 27-4 overall. But the big reason that I'm choosing Utah State is because of their star player Gary Wilkinson. He's a red-head (BIG points) and he's 26 years old. Wilkinson never played basketball in high school and dropped out. He found God, went on a two year mission in Canada, and is now married. This guy's life story is nuts. Now he's the star on one of the most surprising teams in college basketball this year. When in doubt...go with the #1 seed if they have a red head on their team. Notable Seeds: #1 Utah State, #2 Nevada, #3 Idaho, #4 Boise State, #7 San Jose State.

19 down...11 to go.

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