ANALYSIS: Like cat litter, MVC men’s basketball race settling into clumps

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The Missouri Valley Conference men’s basketball race is coming down to the wire with the start of the Arch Madness tournament a little less than two weeks away on March 6.

Indiana State will try to do its part to unclutter the standings (or clutter them even more) when the Sycamores play Saturday at Belmont.

As it stands now, Drake sits first in the conference standings at 14-3, but Northern Iowa (13-4) isn’t far behind with Bradley (12-5) in third. While those top three could flip around a bit, they’re locked into that top-three range.

Missouri State (2-15) is locked into 12th after the Bears lost 66-64 to Valparaiso Wednesday night. Valparaiso (5-12) would have to win out and get some help from other teams, but the Beacons could possibly jump a few spots if the right scenarios happen for them.

Indiana State (7-10) and Southern Illinois (7-10) have been deadlocked with each other and could jump up in the standings if either of them wins out. If either one wins out, it could jump into the mess that is currently Evansville, Murray State, UIC and Illinois State.

The stretch run with the final two regular-season games will obviously see a bit of shifting in the standings and paint a better picture of what the field will look like going into Arch Madness at the Enterprise Center in St. Louis.

Northern Iowa, which has been on a bit of a heater recently, is currently riding a six-game winning streak going into Sunday afternoon’s home game against MVC-leading Drake. That matchup, which tips off at 4 p.m., will be one to watch as Northern Iowa would tie Drake for first with a win. Northern Iowa will desperately want to win the intrastate rivalry as Drake has somewhat of an easy schedule for its last two games.

Drake’s last two games aren’t easy per say as Evansville can put up a fight and Missouri State has shown flashes as of late, but they are much more winnable than what Northern Iowa must face. But it can easily be argued Northern Iowa’s last two games are much tougher as the…

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Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/article/analysis-cat-litter-mvc-mens-002400778.html

Author : The Tribune-Star, Terre Haute, Ind.

Publish date : 2025-02-22 00:24:00

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