INDIANAPOLIS – In the final edition of the NCAA's region rankings before the selection show, Carson-Newman found itself slotted in eighth of the Southeast Region announced by the organization Wednesday with conference tournaments kicking off.
The selection committee uses these rankings as a guideline to make up the NCAA Tournament field. The top eight teams in the region make the NCAA Tournament with three automatic bids going to the winners of the conference tournaments from the South Atlantic Conference, Conference Carolinas and the Peach Belt Conference.
For the No. 1 team in the region, that school gets to host the Southeast Region tournament over the second weekend of March with three wins needed to advance to the National Quarterfinals in Dallas at the St. Joseph Civic Center in St. Joseph, Mo. on March 20-22 with the title game in Dallas on April 1.
The top four teams remained unchanged with Catawba at the top followed by Wingate, Georgia Southwestern and Lenoir-Rhyne. All other slots changed with the exception of Belmont Abbey holding at 10th.
There are no teams from Conference Carolinas in the top eight which means the Lady Eagles would be out of the tournament based off that league getting the automatic bid and the No. 8 seed.
Carson-Newman's RPI dropped to ninth in the region after last week having lost five of the last eight games. Despite holding head-to-head wins over Lenoir-Rhyne (fourth), Clayton State (fifth), USC Aiken (sixth) and splitting against North Georgia (seventh) in the regular season, the Orange and Blue are below those clubs in the rankings.
The Lakers beat Columbus State in the opening round of the Peach Belt Tournament while the Pacers trail by double figures to Young Harris at the time of this writing. North Georgia gets Augusta later this evening.
In the SAC Tournament, the Bears visit Tusculum tonight at 5:30 while the Lady Eagles host the Trojans in a must-win contest for both programs. The Lady Eagles have a better strength of schedule than the Nighthawks.
The Lady Eagles host Anderson Wednesday night at 7 p.m. in the opening round of the SAC Tournament. Broadcast coverage can be found on 106.3 (WPFT-FM, Sevierville) and cneagles.com/live starting at 6:45 with video available on FloSports with a paid subscription.
- CN -
