One-day showcase gives mid-majors shot to take center stage

08:56 PM CST on Thursday, February 17, 2005

At times, the glut of televised college basketball games creates the illusion the regular season is one big unwieldy non-descript boulder.

In reality, there are small, big, plain and glitzy games – and a whole lot of hidden gems, if you take the time to look for them. TV also plays a heavy-handed role in who plays whom, where and when, sometimes inconveniencing the ticket-buying customer.

That said, it's hard not to anticipate Bracket Buster Saturday, the ESPN-contrived, one-day, 11-game tournament matching top-tier teams from so-called mid-major conferences. This made-by-TV event happens to be good for college basketball; nice national exposure for the schools involved; an opportunity for some teams to enhance their chances for an NCAA Tournament bid; and, yes, fun for fans.

Naturally, whenever wins and losses are at stake, there's one faction standing by with a bucket of pessimism: worrywart coaches.

"I don't like the Bracket Buster," said UT-El Paso coach Doc Sadler, whose team plays at No. 19 Pacific at 11 p.m. in the marquee Buster matchup. "The only good thing of the whole deal is if you're on ESPN and if you win."

Yes, coach, that's the point. It's risk-reward, not reward-reward.

The reward is that NCAA Tournament bubble teams like UTEP, Miami of Ohio, Vermont, Wichita State and Wisconsin-Milwaukee get a chance to prove their mettle against teams of similar stature. Another reward is that on a weekend that has Syracuse at Boston College (Saturday) and Wake Forest at Duke (Sunday) as main attractions, fans get a sneak preview of teams that, come March, will fill some of the Nos. 9-16-seed slots in their NCAA Tournament pools.

The risk is that some of Saturday's losers could actually hurt their chances of gaining an NCAA at-large bid. But Western Athletic Conference commissioner Karl Benson, whose league has UTEP, Nevada, Rice and Hawaii in Buster games, said the potential upside is worth it.

There's another benefit. Nevada coach Mark Fox points out mid-majors have difficulty sche- duling top-notch opponents. Most major-conference schools, he says, are reluctant to play at a Vermont or an Illinois State. Said Fox: "The Bracket Buster allows us to add another quality team."

This is the third year of Bracket Buster. ESPN officials start with a pool of 64 potential teams. In late January, they announced the 22 Bracket Buster teams and which schools would play host.

Part of the agreement is that the 11 teams playing host on Saturday must travel to their opponents' gyms next season.

Perhaps Sadler would feel differently if Pacific were coming to his place, but he insists that he had misgivings before the pairings were announced.

"It's just at a bad time," he said, pointing out that the Miners play at Hawaii on Monday.

UTEP is 20-6, but two of its victories were against non-Division I teams. The second-place Miners trail Nevada by two games in the WAC, having lost a 62-60 home heartbreaker to the Wolf Pack last week.

Sadler said he just hopes the NCAA follows recent form and invites two WAC teams. But if the Miners get knocked out early in the WAC tournament – or if a team besides Nevada or UTEP wins the tournament – they could be passed up.

As the coach of the team that received the last of the 34 NCAA at-large bids last season, Sadler knows how fine the line can be. Imagine what his take will be if the Miners pull an upset at Pacific on Saturday night.

E-mail btownsend@dallasnews.com

Wichita State at Miami of Ohio (11 a.m. ESPN2)

Vermont at Nevada (1 p.m. ESPN2)

Western Michigan at No. Iowa (3 p.m. ESPN2)

So. Illinois at Kent State (5 p.m. ESPN2)

Wisconsin-Milwaukee at Hawaii (7 p.m. ESPN2)

UT-El Paso at Pacific (11 p.m. ESPN)

Arkansas-Little Rock at Bowling Green

Buffalo at Fresno State

Drexel at Ball State

Illinois State at Wisconsin-Green Bay

Murray State at Rice

In the view of the NCAA Tournament selection committee, there are not-so-bad losses and extremely damaging losses.

On Monday, Kansas incurred a not-so-bad, double-overtime defeat at Texas Tech. The next night, Kentucky suffered a crippling loss at South Carolina.

The difference? According to collegerpi.com, Texas Tech entered the week with the 43rd-best RPI in the country; South Carolina was No. 76. Kansas had the top RPI in the country and was No. 1 in strength of schedule; Kentucky was No. 11 in RPI, No. 56 in strength of schedule.

Bottom line: Kansas and Illinois remain front-runners for NCAA Tournament No. 1 seeds. Kentucky, which had the inside track for a top seed, is in a free-for-all with Wake Forest, North Carolina, Boston College and Duke. There are still three weeks left before Selection Sunday, but the picture should clear somewhat this weekend when No. 6 Boston College hosts No. 9 Syracuse (Saturday) and No. 5 Wake plays at No. 7 Duke (Sunday).

Those teams play in the stronger Big East and ACC and thus have more opportunities to impress the committee. Kentucky plays in the weaker SEC, and come March its 12-point loss in Columbia, S.C., will stick out like a proverbial sore thumb.

As of last week, Garland products had two of the top five active Division I streaks of double-digit scoring games.

Ike Diogu of Garland High and Arizona State was No. 1 at 85 games and counting. But last Thursday, Oral Roberts guard and South Garland product Ken Tutt's streak of 43 (the fifth-longest in the country) ended when he scored six points in an 85-55 victory over Western Illinois.

Tutt led the nation in 3-point shooting (44.9 percent) as a freshman last season. He is shooting 40 percent this season.

*Active streak (Indiana hosts Northwestern on March 5; Kentucky beat Vanderbilt on Jan. 12).