Scores

Tuesday, February 14

Butler 63 Loyola-Illinois 57

Milwaukee 86 Cleveland State 84

Green Bay 71 Youngstown State 65

Valparaiso 74 Illinois-Chicago 65

Wednesday, February 15

Detroit 71 Wright State 55

Friday, February 17

Loyola Marymount 61 Valparaiso 53

Saturday, February 18

Drexel 69 Cleveland State 49

Butler 75 Indiana State 54

Detroit 82 James Madison 70

Green Bay 54 Eastern Michigan 49

Milwaukee 67 Fairfield 63

Wright State 76 UMKC 62

Illinois-Chicago 67 Eastern Illinois 63

Austin Peay 71 Youngstown State 68

Loyola-Illinois 56 Bradley 44

It was a very tough week for the Horizon League. If there was any remaining shred of hope for the conference in its attempt to get an at-large candidate for the NCAA Tournament, it was eliminated in the BracketBusters event matching mid-majors from different leagues against each other. On Friday night, Loyola Marymount of the West Coast Conference turned back the Valparaiso Crusaders in a fiercely contested game in Los Angeles. Valpo was the ascendant team in the Horizon League, having stormed past Cleveland State for the top spot in the neighborhood, but the Crusaders didn’t have enough quickness or three-point shooting to get past the Lions on the road. Valpo was rocked on its heels at times by Loyola Marymount’s speed, but the Crusaders largely stood their ground. They used clever drive-and-kick plays to draw in LMU’s defense and then find an open three-point shooter on the perimeter. LMU’s defense was left scrambling and chasing for much of the second half, and this is why the Horizon leaders were able to stay close for quite some time. However, those three-point shots simply didn’t fall – not enough of them, at any rate. A couple of threes that would have sustained Valparaiso’s momentum rimmed in and out, stifling the visitors’ rally and snuffing out whatever chance the Crusaders had of getting an at-large slot in Bracketville.

Then came Saturday, which was Cleveland State’s absolute last stand following a series of losses in conference play. If the Vikings were going to make one last push at an at-large bid, it needed to happen against the Drexel Dragons. However, the Vikings instead looked spent from start to finish. Without playmaker D’Aundray Brown, Cleveland State just didn’t have the weapons or the resources it needed to stay on the court with a Drexel team that is making a serious case for an at-large NCAA bid out of the Colonial Athletic Association. BracketBusters games are meant to sift pretenders from contenders, and so it must be said that the Horizon League didn’t really measure up – not at the top tier, anyway. Butler and Milwaukee produced encouraging wins over Indiana State (Missouri Valley) and Fairfield (Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference), but the Bulldogs and Panthers are not part of the at-large conversation and never really were to begin with. The Horizon League will be a one-bid league this season, and the BracketBusters event confirmed as much.

Now the focus shifts to the race for positioning in the league with one week left in the regular season. Valparaiso, at 12-4, leads second-place Cleveland State by 1.5 games. However, if the two teams tie, Valpo also owns the head-to-head tiebreaker as a result of a two-game sweep of the season series. This means Valpo just needs to win one of its final two games to clinch the top seed and home court in the tournament semifinals. Cleveland State is therefore a longshot to overtake Valpo for the top seed; the Vikings are trying to hold off Butler and Detroit, who both sit at 10-6 in the league, for the second seed and the other double bye in the tournament (seeds 3 through 10 play each other in two rounds before the semifinals). The challenge for Cleveland State is that it is a short-handed team facing a three-games-in-five-days gauntlet from Feb. 21 through Feb. 25. The Vikings must win two of three if they want to expect a No. 2 seed, and one of those wins will need to come on Feb. 23 against Detroit.

Matt Zemek
DFN Sports Senior Staff Writer