March Madness: Thursday’s conference tournament breakdown

To true college basketball aficionados, the real “March Madness” already has started. That’s because the “lesser” conference tournaments have begun; those are the leagues in which you must win your conference tourney to even get into the Big Dance. The pressure is immense, and a marvelous regular season can mean nothing.

Here’s a look at the three tournaments that start Thursday. Two — the Missouri Valley and the West Coast — have a ton of intrigue; the MVC is intriguing because of the logjam at the top, while the WCC is intriguing because of a potential gigantic quarterfinal matchup. (Here’s a look at the complete conference tournament schedule. March Madness reigns.)

Missouri Valley Conference

When: March 3-6 (the schedule is here)
Where: Enterprise Center, St. Louis
TV for final: March 6, 2 p.m. ET, CBS
Regular-season champ: Northern Iowa
Format: All 10 teams qualify.
Projected NCAA bids: 1-2.
The buzz: This should be a great tournament. Northern Iowa, which has won four in a row and nine of 10, beat Loyola-Chicago on Saturday to win the regular-season title. The loss dropped Loyola into a three-way tie for second, but because of conference tiebreakers, the Ramblers are the No. 4 seed; Missouri State is the No. 2 and Drake the No. 3. Any of the top four could win, but Loyola would seem to be the only one with even a ghost of a chance at an NCAA at-large bid. Loyola is 31^st in the NET, 32 spots ahead of everyone else in the league (Missouri State is 63^rd). But Loyola has just two Quad 1 wins, and that it did not win the regular-season title also hurts. Missouri State comes in having won five of six. Drake has won five in a row and nine of 12. On the other side: Loyola has won just four of seven. Three of the top four swept one of the other top four seeds: Drake swept Loyola, Missouri State swept Drake and UNI swept Missouri State. UNI has the league’s best player in 6-foot-4 junior G A.J. Green, who has impressive range, hits 38 percent from beyond the arc and 91 percent from the line, and comes in having scored at least 20 in six consecutive games. Can he lift the Panthers into the NCAA tourney for the first time since 2016?
The pick: Northern Iowa

Sun Belt Conference

When: March 3, 5-7 (the schedule is here)
Where: Pensacola Bay Center, Pensacola, Fla.
TV for final: March 7, 7 p.m. ET, ESPN2
Regular-season champ: Texas State
Format: All 12 teams qualify.
Projected NCAA bids: 1.
The buzz: COVD issues wreaked havoc on the league’s schedule. Texas State won the regular-season title by going 12-3. Second-seeded Appalachian State also won 12 conference games — but the Mountaineers played 18 league games and finished 12-6. Third-seeded Georgia State went 9-5 in the conference — and didn’t play Texas State at all. Anyway, you get the idea. Texas State, which enters on a nine-game winning streak, is looking for its first NCAA appearance since 1997. The Bobcats prefer a slow pace, and while they hit 38.1 percent of their 3-pointers, they don’t take a lot of them. App State, the surprise tourney winner last season, plays good defense but comes in having lost three of five. Georgia State has won seven in a row. The Panthers are an abysmal shooting team (40.1 percent as a team, including 32 percent from 3-point range), but they pound the offensive glass, play good defense and force turnovers. Seventh-seeded Coastal Carolina, coached by Cliff Ellis, comes in having won four of five and has been tough defensively. If the Chanticleers are hot from outside, they could make a run; they are on the same side of the bracket as App State and Georgia State.
The pick: Georgia State

West Coast Conference

When: March 3-5, 7-8 (the schedule is here)
Where: Orleans Arena, Las Vegas
TV for final: March 8, 9 p.m. ET, ESPN
Regular-season champ: Gonzaga
Format: All 10 teams qualify. Top-seeded Gonzaga and second-seeded Saint Mary’s have byes until the semifinals.
Projected NCAA bids: 2-3.
The buzz: Gonzaga and Saint Mary’s are NCAA tourney locks. Gonzaga is No. 1 in the NET rankings and has a shot at being the overall No. 1 seed in the NCAA tournament. The intrigue comes with fourth-seeded San Francisco and fifth-seeded BYU, who are on track to meet in the quarterfinals. (Santa Clara is seeded third, but the Broncos have no shot at an at-large). BYU’s first game will be in the second round, while USF has a bye until the quarterfinals. It might be smart to look at a potential BYU-USF quarterfinal as an NCAA elimination game. While San Francisco is 27^th in the NET rankings, the Dons (looking for their first NCAA bid since 1998 and their second since 1982) have just three Quad 1 wins and are 8-7 against Quad 1 and 2 teams. BYU has four Quad 1 wins (including over Saint Mary’s) and is 7-8 vs. Quad 1 and 2 squads. BYU and USF split during the regular season. BYU needs senior G Alex Barcello to play well; USF is more of a spread-the-wealth club, but the Dons have to hit their 3-pointers to beat good opponents. Thus, the conference tourney game to watch here is the BYU-USF quarterfinal (assuming BYU wins its second-round game, of course; one of the potential opponents is ninth-seeded Pacific, which beat the Cougars by three at home in late January). By the way, the winner of BYU-USF gets Gonzaga in a semifinal, so ….
The pick: Gonzaga