St. Louis is hosting this weekend’s Missouri Valley Conference Tournament and as expected, a good fan base from Springfield should be making their way up Saturday evening to watch the Missouri State Bears take on #2 seed Wichita State at Scottrade Center. What I like about the Missouri Valley Conference Tournament…this is one of those postseason weekends where so much is riding on winning this thing to secure the automatic bid into the NCAA Tournament.
In many ways, it makes it a better tournament than the Big 12 or SEC. What I mean by that is you could have a Kansas or Kentucky stumble in their tournament and they’re still going to the Big Dance. You’ll remember Missouri State was edged out of the NCAA’s a couple of years ago when the Bears lost to Indiana State in the MVC finals. That year, MSU was by far the best team during th regular season and went 17-4 against conference opponents up until that loss. It cost them a bid.
This year, the odds on favorites to be playing on Sunday figure to be the top two seeds, Creighton and Wichita State, two programs that bring a lot of fans to the St. Louis area.
Tim Fisher, who helps out here at Missourinet Sports, is in St. Louis this weekend covering the tournament and I caught up with him for a Google Hangout to talk hoops and the future of the MVC.