Sunday, March 10, 2019

Sun Belt conference tournament preview

This is part 18 of a 32-part series.

Standings:
Georgia St 13-5
UT Arlington 12-6
Georgia Southern 12-6
Texas St 12-6
Louisiana 10-8
Coastal Carolina 9-9
Louisiana-Monroe 9-9
South Alabama 8-10
Arkansas St 7-11
Appalachian St 6-12
Troy 5-13
Little Rock 5-13

Format:
Exotic ladder format alert!  Only 10 teams qualify.  Top 2 seeds get double bye'd into the semifinals.  Everything happens at a neutral site in New Orleans March 12-17.

Matchups:
1) Georgia St vs. 4) Texas St vs. 5) Louisiana vs. 8/9) South Alabama/Arkansas St
2) UT Arlington vs. 3) Georgia Southern vs. 6) Coastal Carolina vs. 7/10) Louisiana-Monroe/Appalachian St

The stakes:
Not a lot.  CNET 17.  The conference champ should be able to avoid the 16 line, but definitely can't reach the 13 line.  Stradding the 14/15 line depending on who wins.

Georgia St has some reasonable results in their non-con, beating ETSU and @Alabama.  So 14 is reasonable for them (and who knows, maybe 13 is reachable after all).  The other resumes in the conference are more modest.  It might be the easiest conference for which to peg a seed on ahead of time, IMO.

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