The ‘Flying V’ bracket finally claimed Georgia Southern, as super Cinderella comes up just short of March Madness.
Troy is the Sun Belt’s best team. Fitting, it’s moving on to the NCAA Tournament.
When NCAA Tournament expands, it won’t be to benefit of midmajors. Auto bids remain the way to access.
PENSACOLA, Florida – The madness started the way madness often does, unnoticed and under the cover of darkness.
Georgia Southern began its nearly weeklong trek to the Sun Belt Tournament championship game one night last week in front of a crowd that numbered in the hundreds, not the thousands.
As the Sun Belt’s No. 10 seed, the Eagles would need to win six games in six days to secure one of those precious auto bids that unlock NCAA Tournament access for super Cinderellas, no matter their record.
A conference 10-seed, becoming a bid-stealer? That really would be mad, but, hey, this is March.
The way the Sun Belt’s “Flying V” bracket works, teams with double-digit seeds like Georgia Southern face a rigorous journey to reach the point of the “V,” the finals, while the conference’s best teams start several rounds closer to the finish line.
The NCAA Tournament starts next week, and mid-majors supply the event’s charm and paint some of the most epic scenes for Luther Vandross to croon over. Real ones know, though, the upsets and the mad twists begin in the conference tourneys, where precious NCAA access is on the line, even for teams with damaged records and flawed resumes.
One by one, night by night, Georgia Southern carved through Old Dominion, Arkansas State, South Alabama, Coastal Carolina and Marshall.
Down went Sun Belt’s No. 3 seed. Out went the No. 2.
One more upset, and the Eagles wouldn’t just be soaring, they’d be dancing.
And you can say they ran out of steam, and that’d probably be right. Or you can say they simply ran into the Sun Belt’s best team, and that’d be right, too.
However you put it, super Cinderella bowed out. The Sun Belt’s No. 1 seed, Troy, is headed to the NCAA Tournament for a second straight year after a 77-61 victory to turn back Georgia Southern.
Troy beating Georgia Southern makes NCAA Tournament bracket better
This result works neatly for the Sun Belt, that its best team will be on display on the sport’s biggest stage. Troy is likely headed somewhere in the direction of the 14-seed line, after its frontcourt dominated in the paint against the Eagles.
It’s good for March Madness when the best teams in mid-major conferences win their respective conference tournaments. That means a better batch of underdogs.
And, still, what a story it would have been — a story that can only be told in March — if Georgia Southern had gotten a crack at playing a No. 1 or a No. 2 seed in a first-round game after a six-night stand in this Panhandle city that’s home to the world-famous Blue Angels and pristine beaches with sugar-white sand.
Georgia Southern came out of halftime burying buckets in a furious final stand that cut Troy’s lead to four points. Ah, but it wasn’t to be, and when Troy’s star big man Victor Valdes made a bucket in the paint to re-establish a double-digit lead, it was clear the postgame Fiskers were headed to the Trojans to do the net snipping.
March Madness expansion is coming, but not to help mid-majors
No matter whether the bracket grows to 72 or 76 or even 80 teams, it’s not going to be big enough for 10th-place teams from the Sun Belt.
For teams like Georgia Southern, there’s still only one way in: By banging down the door with six wins in six nights and getting an auto bid.
And in those rare instances when a super Cinderella pulls it off, it’ll be madness, the likes of which Georgia Southern attempted, before Troy took its rightful place in the tournament every mid-major pains to reach.
Blake Toppmeyer is a columnist for the USA TODAY Network. Email him at BToppmeyer@gannett.com and follow him on X @btoppmeyer.