Tip off at high noon from the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York. Four games to decide the Atlantic 10’s Final Four.
No. 1 St. Louis (13-3/24-6) vs. No. 9 Charlotte (8-8/21-10)
Dwayne Evans (12.9) leads four Bills in double figures followed by Kwamain Mitchell (10.2), Cody Ellis (10.1) and Mike McCall Jr. (10.0).
DeMario Mayfield (11.7) paces the 49ers. Chris Braswell (11.6) and Pierria Henry (10.5) follow.
Ellis scored 18 off the bench as SLU topped Charlotte 76-58 earlier this season.
St. Louis leads the A10 holding opponents to 61.3 points per game. The Bills have a defensive rebounding percentage of 71 percent.
Charlotte gets on the offensive glass to the tune 36.5 percent – good for fourth in the conference.
No. 4 La Salle (11-5/21-8) vs. No. 5 Butler (11-5/25-7)
Ramon Galloway scores 17 a game for the Explorers with Tyreek Duren chipping in 15 and Tyrone Garland adding 12.7 and Jerrell Wright getting 10.2.
Rotnei Clarke (16.8) leads four Bulldogs in doubles with Andrew Smith (11.2), Roosevelt Jones (10.2) and Kellen Dunham (10.1) adding to the good.
Clarke leads the conference in free throw percentage (93.9) and threes made per game (3.3).
La Salle leads the conference in three-point defense holding opposing shooters to just 28 percent from long range.
The Explorers will be playing the tournament with sophomore forward Steve Zack.
No. 2 VCU (12-4/24-7) vs. No. 10 St. Joseph’s (8-8/18-12)
Treveon Graham leads VCU with 17. Juvonte Reddic (14.5), Troy Daniels (12.2) and Rob Brandenburg (10.6) add to the total.
Tay Jones scores 14 for the Hawks with Langston Galloway adding 13.3 along with Ronald Roberts Jr (11.4) and C.J. Aiken (10.8).
VCU’s turnover of +7.3 is by far the best in the league. St. Louis is second at 4.2.
The Hawks lead the way with nearly six blocks per game. Aiken shares the conference lead with 2.5 Return to Senders per contest.
No. 3 Temple (11-5/23-8) vs. No. 6 Massachussetts (9-7/20-10)
Conference player of the year, Khalif Wyatt (19.9) leads the Owls through their last trip to the A10 tournament. Scootie Randall adds 11.8 and Anthony Lee chips in 10.3.
Chaz Williams scores 15 for the Minutemen with Jesse Morgan adding 13.4 and Terrell Vinson tallying 12.6 per contest.
Temple’s 7.5 threes made per game is good for third in the conference.
UMass tops the A10 handing out 15.7 assists per game.
How good is the Billikens’ defense? 7 minutes in and 49ers have turned the ball over 5 times. St. Louis has converted those turnovers in 7 early points and lead 11-8.
Dwayne Evans was putting a clinic on early in the post (11 points), but picked up his second foul mid-first half and had to sit. A minute into the second half, picked up his third foul, his second offensive foul and has to sit again.
Billkens lead 41-30 with 15:58 left in the game.
Charlotte keeps trying to come back in the game. Chris Braswell hits a three, forgets that he is down by 10, salute the camera on the way back down the floor. Billikens promptly come down the floor and use a Grandy Glaze kiss to put the lead back the 11, 47-36.
Billikens defense is flat out nasty. Charlotte came into the game averaging 66 points per game. Less than a minute to go and the 49ers have put up just 54. The second half hasn’t been close as St. Louis leads 69-54.
Wow – VCU is the seven seed. What a great conference. Wish they were sticking together.
Oops. Good catch. I made the edit. VCU is the 2 seed.
LaSalle guards have scored 26 of the team’s 35 first half points. Butler meanwhile pounded the paint early and has as 22-16 advantage early on.
Ramon Galloway is struggling for LaSalle. Is 1 for 8 from the field and 0 for 6 from the field. Seems really hesitant to pull the trigger in the second half.
Seeing the VCU “havoc” pressure is something to see in person. St. Joe’s so far has handled the pressure pretty well with just 6 turnovers so far in the half. VCU leads 17-13 .
I would absolutely dread having to face either VCU or Louisville in the tournament.
Absolutely. Haven’t seen a lot of Louisville, but VCU’s pressure is incredible. Hard to believe but there is a difference between seeing it on TV and in person. They don’t let up and Shaka Smart went 11 deep yesterday. Have to think he is going to use that to his advantage in wearing opponents down.
Louisville is pretty disruptive in the 3/4 court with Peyton Siva and Russ Smith. Smith has really been coming on in the Big East tournament. If he continues, Louisville will be tough. Plus, their uniforms are distracting enough for at least a 10-point swing.
The surprise early in the Butler/ St. Louis game is that Butler normally plays a man to man defense, starts out in a 2-3 zone.
Zone worked for a couple of possessions but they switched back. All tied at 11.
Dwayne Evans continues to have a monster tournament for the Billikens. 10 points and 9 rebounds, well on his way to a double double.
St. Louis leads 42-41 w/ 10:59 to play
Absolutely dominant performance by St. Louis against Butler. Held Butler to 5 field goals in the last 12:30 of the game. 2 of those field goals came when the benches were emptied.
Have to think that the 3 games in 3 days wore on Butler who doesn’t go that deep on their bench.
Rotnei Clarke hit a pair of 3s in the first 5 minutes of the game – didn’t hit one the rest of the game. Billikens extended their perimeter defense and only allowed him to get four threes the rest of the game.