Newsletter: MTE Results, Surprise Lines, Defending Champs Struggling
Newsletter: MTE Results, Surprise Lines, Defending Champs Struggling
Feast Week is upon us, as you all should know by now. This means that multi-team events are taking place all over the country as well as on foreign soil.
Currently, the SFA men are in the Cayman Islands. The ACU men are in the U.S. Virgin Islands. Utah Valley men’s basketball is in St. Augustine, Florida for the Jacksonville Classic.
Tarleton men’s basketball is in Southern California for the SoCal Challenge. CBU just finished up the Lancer Joust in Riverside. Utah Tech finished up the Lake Erie Classic on Saturday. GCU just finished up the inaugural Arizona Tip-Off Sunday night.
So, it is a busy time for college basketball.
Let’s get right to the results. First, make sure you subscribe to the WAC Hoops Nation Newsletter. You can be a free subscriber or, if you are feeling generous and want to help us continue to bring you great content, you can subscribe for $8 per month or $80 per year. A gift subscription is always welcome. Just make sure you subscribe one way or the other so you never miss the newsletter three times a week.
Wildcats to Play for the Title
Less than a week ago, the ACU men’s basketball team lost a bad home game to Prairie View A&M. It was the home opener for the Wildcats and it wasn’t pretty.
However, a weekend trip to the U.S. Virgin Islands might have been to blame.
Whatever it was, something has clicked in two games at the Paradise Jam. ACU beat San Jose State on Friday in the opening round. And two nights later, on Sunday, led start to finish in a double digit win over Fordham.
Hunter Jack Madden was the hero in Friday’s win. Ali Dibba was the hero in Sunday’s win.
Now, ACU gets a shot to come back to West Texas with an MTE title. The Wildcats take on Missouri Valley Conference foe Missouri State on Monday night.
Crazy to think that last Tuesday, the Wildcats lost to a sub-250 KenPom team and have not won back-to-back games to advance to a championship game.
The Wildcats are now 3-1 away from Moody Coliseum. Perhaps we can call them Road Warriors?
SFA/Utah Valley Get Opening Round Wins
Utah Valley got things started early on Sunday morning in the Jacksonville Classic. Todd Phillips’ crew started really slow…like to a point where they had more turnovers than field goals made at one point.
But, things began to open up midway through the first half. An 8-0 run led to a halftime lead that the Wolverines never relinquished. Tanner Toolson had 22 points in the win. One stat that sticks out about the 67-65 win over Southern Miss is the free throw shooting. The Golden Eagles were 15-24 from the charity stripe. Utah Valley was 9-14. Free throws are free. Utah Valley advances to take on Cornell in the Bay Bracket championship game on Monday afternoon.
SFA guard AJ Cajuste had procedure done about two weeks before the 2023-24 season tipped off. So, if he looked a little slower than normal or not as explosive in a loss at Middle Tennessee, now you know why.
But, 10 days later, Cajuste seems to be back to normal. In an explosive second half, Cajuste put SFA on his back in an 86-76 win over LMU in the first round of the Cayman Islands Classic. Cajuste had a game-high 25 points to help the Jacks overcome a 6-point halftime deficit and outscore LMU by 17 in the second half en route to SFA’s third win of the season. The Jacks face off against Drake of the Missouri Valley Conference on Monday in the Cayman Islands Classic semifinals.
Surprise Lines
Let’s go back to all three of those games mentioned above. Each one had a surprise line. All three teams were underdogs according to ESPNbet.com coming into Sunday. All three.
Utah Valley was a 2.5-point underdog. SFA was a 1.5-point underdog. And ACU was a 2.5-point underdog. I know capper had two of the three as his favorites. But, it is still interesting that all three were underdogs and all three won outright. You just love to see it.
Defending WAC Champs are Struggling
The first season in the WAC was a magical one for Tracy Mason and the Southern Utah women’s basketball team.
The T-Birds won the WAC regular season title and WAC Tournament title to go to their first-ever NCAA Tournament.
However, as we all know, change happens. Associate head coach Katie Clayman is now at High Point University. WAC Defensive Player of the Year Lizzie Williamson is at NC State. And WAC Tournament MVP Cherita Daugherty is not walking onto the floor at America First Events Center anymore.
That doesn’t mean the cupboard is all bare. At least, it didn’t. That is, unless you have been paying attention.
All-WAC Second Team selection Tomekia Whitman has not played a minute. Utah Valley transfer Jaeden Brown has not played a minute. And, as of this newsletter, it is unknown if Brown will play at all as per her Instagram, Brown gave birth to her daughter Sky this past week.
So, that leaves Megan Smith, Daylani Ballena, and Samantha Johnston as the lone trio of key returners for the defending champs.
And while there have been moments of really good basketball, ultimately things haven’t gone the T-Birds way early on. There was the home loss against former Big Sky foe Eastern Washington to open the seaosn. Then there was the debacle against Western Kentucky at America First Events Center. And on Sunday, there was a double digit loss at UC Santa Barbara.
SUU sits at 1-3. The good news is there is time to catch their breath. The bad news is that in nine days, the T-Birds host a red-hot CBU squad that is off to a 4-0 start with two of those wins coming on the road. CBU is also the team the T-Birds beat in the WAC Tournament title game so there is a little more at stake in the WAC opener for both teams.
Some other good news for the T-Birds. SUU lost four of its first five games against Division I competition in 2022-23. Two of those losses were at Eastern Washington and at home to UC Santa Barbara.
So, not all is lost. Perhaps this is an overreaction to losses early on in non-conference play. Problem is, the T-Birds raised their own bar last season with a conference title. Now, there are expectations in Cedar City. And thus far, they haven’t necessarily been met.