#9 Creighton v. #8 Louisville, 11:15 am, CBS — Its the first game of the Men’s NCAA Basketball Tournament. The Bluejays are in the Big Dance for the 5th year in a row and have been to the Sweet 16 in 2021, 2023 and last year. Creighton has three top scorers including 7’1″ Senior Center Ryan Kalkbrenner averaging 19.4 and 8.8 rebounds a game. The big guy is more than just an offensive threat — Kalkbrenner is a four time Big East Defensive Player of the Year — the only other player to do that is Hall of Famer Patrick Ewing of Georgetown.
This is the runner up game — Creighton was the runner up in the Big East tournament to St. John’s and the Cardinals were runners up to Duke in the ACC Tournament. Louisville is led by 6-6 Junior Guard Terrence Edwards 16.6 ppg and 6-2 Senior Guard Chucky Hepburn at 16.2 ppg. Edwards had 29 points against Duke and was 5-12 on his threes while Hepburn put in 14 but was 1-8 from three point land against the Blue Devils. Louisville did not win a game against a ranked opponent until beating #10 Clemson in the ACC Semifinals. Creighton beat then #1 Kansas on Dec. 4 and had Big East victories over UConn, Marquette and St. John’s.
#11 Drake v. #6 Missouri, 6:35 pm, tru TV — With rumors swirling around the future of Head Coach Ben McCollum, the Bulldogs will try to focus on the Tigers. Drake is in the tournament field for the third year in a row, they have lost in the first round the last two years to #5 Miami and last year to #7 Washington St. The Bulldogs are led by transfer Junior Bennett Stirtz who was the Larry Bird Player of the Year in the Missouri Valley Conference averaging 19.1 ppg and 5.7 assists per game. Stirtz came to Drake from NCAA Division II NW Missouri St. where he was a 2nd team all-league player for the Bearcats. Junior Guard Tavian Banks, Senior Forward Daniel Abreu and Senior Guard Mitch Mascari all average about 10 points a game.
Missouri missed the tournament last year and was upset by Princeton in the 2nd round in 2023. The Tigers finished in the middle of the pack of the tough SEC — 8th place with a 10-8 conference mark. Missouri’s signature win was over then #5 Florida on January 14 in Gainsville. The Tigers also had wins over Ole Miss and Alabama but they have lost 5 of their last 7 games which included a revenge win for the Gators in the SEC Tournament. Three guards lead Missouri in scoring — Junior Mark Mitchell (14.1 ppg), Senior Caleb Grill (13.7) and Senior Tamar Bates (13.4).
#15 Omaha v. #2 St. John’s, 8:45, CBS — The Mavericks are making their first ever NCAA Tournament appearance after moving up from Division II in 2015. Omaha won the Summit League as the #1 seed and beating #2 seed St. Thomas, Minnesota in the conference finals. After winning their first 2 games of the season, the Mavericks lost 5 in a row to Minnesota, UNLV, Alabama St., Southern Utah, and Akron — the loss to the Gophers was 68-64. 6-8 Senior Maquel Sutton leads Omaha averaging 19.1 ppg and largely gets his points in the paint with only 9 made threes on the season.
The Red Storm’s season has been one of the stories of college basketball this season with the return of Rick Pitino to a championship contending team. After taking Iona to the Big Dance in 2 of his three seasons, he took the St. John’s job the previous off-season and in one year took the team from 20 wins to the Big East title and a number two seed. Pitino brought R.J. Luis Junior from UMass last season and he has led the Red Storm in scoring at 18.4 ppg
