SoCon conference tournament preview

This is part 9 of a 32-part series.

Standings:
UNC-Greensboro 15-3
East Tennessee St 14-4
Furman 13-5
Wofford 11-7
Mercer 11-7
Western Carolina 8-10
Samford 6-12
The Citadel 5-13
VMI 4-14
Chattanooga 3-15

Format:
Nice and simple, 4 straight days from March 2-5.  Asheville as a neutral host.

Matchups:
1) UNC-Greensboro vs. 8/9) Citadel/VMI
4) Mercer vs. 5) Wofford
3) Furman vs. 6) Western Carolina
2) East Tennessee St vs. 7/10) Samford/Chattanooga

The stakes:
CRPI 16, with 3 teams just tucking themselves inside the RPI Top 100.  This should mean, in general, a 13 or 14 seed for the conference barring something oblong happening in the next week.

ETSU was actually in decent shape but punted 4 out of their last 5 games to lose the conference.  There wasn't an at-large resume in place before that, though.  But it does cost them a possible NIT bid; none of these teams are good enough to get an at-large to that tourney.  UNCG has a win at NC State and Wofford at UNC, which could be worth a seed line to the committee if things break right.

As is rather evident from the standings, top 5 are CIT-eligible.  As none of them are NIT-worthy, we'll see how many of them play.