The 16th-seeded Mt. St. Mary’s Mountaineers (19-15) take on the No. 16 seed New Orleans Privateers (20-11) in a “First Four” game. The game will be played at the University of Dayton Arena in Dayton on Tuesday at 6:40 p.m. E.T.
Preview: Mt. St. Mary’s made it to the Big Dance by winning the NEC regular and postseason championships. They beat St. Francis (Pa.) 71-61 in the NEC Championship game last week. Guards Elijah Long (15.4 ppg) and Junior Robinson (14.1 ppg) lead the way for Mt. St. Mary’s.
Mount legends, Coach Jamion Christian and Coach Jim Phelan re-living the #NEC17 Championship win! #MountProud pic.twitter.com/0mQgm8M9OC
— Mount St. Mary's U (@MSMU) March 10, 2017
New Orleans, meanwhile, beat Texas A&M Corpus-Christi 68-65 to win the Southland Conference title. Senior forward Erik Thomas (19.5 ppg, 7.8 rpg) is UNO’s top gun.
The winner of this game will face top-seeded Villanova. You can check out the entire NCAA Tournament bracket here. You can also see how the committee ranked the teams 1-68 here.
Date: Tuesday, March 14
Time: 6:40 p.m. E.T.
TV Channel: truTV
Location: University of Dayton Arena in Dayton, Ohio
Announcers: Brian Anderson, Clark Kellogg, Lewis Johnson
Opening Betting Line: New Orleans -1.5, via OddsShark
Mt. St. Mary’s has made four previous NCAA Tournament appearances, the last coming in 2014. They fell in the “First Four” that year, losing 71-64 to Albany.
This is first NCAA appearance for New Orleans since 1996, and the fifth overall for the Privateers. In 1996, UNO was an 11-seed and lost to sixth-seeded North Carolina 83-62.
Prediction: This game is a toss-up, as neither of these teams have a ton of NCAA Tournament experience and are rather unfamiliar to each other.
We’ll say Mt. St. Mary’s sneaks one out and earns a date with Villanova.
