Well – the late finals are not really that interesting at the moment as Oral Roberts and Gonzaga are cruising with double digit leads (think at the moment they are both over 20 points in the second half).  Congratulations go to both Northern Kentucky and College of Charleston for winning their conference’s auto-bids.

And since I made some slight progress on my selection board, we might as well do a quick preview of Wednesday now instead of falling asleep watching the Gonzaga / St. Mary’s game.  If I wake up early enough, I will update the matchups of the late semifinals.

There are three automatic bids to be decided in conference finals – no bubbles will burst thanks to a bid stealer, but definitely some higher seeds trying to win won more game to continue their season.

5 pm – SOUTHLAND – regular season champ Texas A&M – Corpus Christi (22-10) vs. 2nd seed Northwestern State (22-10)

7:30 pm – PATRIOT – regular season champ Colgate (25-8) vs. 6th seed Lafayette (11-22)

11:30 pm – BIG SKY – 9th seed Cinderella Northern Arizona (12-22)  vs winner of 2nd seed Montana St (24-9), who survived a late night double overtime 60-58 victory over 3rd seed Weber St.

For the Richmond folks, I know a lot of people care about the two local schools, UVA, and VT.  Virginia and VCU won’t start their tournaments until Thursday.  But the other two both won today – so Richmond gets George Mason (2 pm) next and Virginia Tech gets NC State (9:30 pm) in those two teams quests to win 5 games in 5 days to keep their seasons going.

For the remaining bubble teams that play on Wednesday, these tend to be the “Can’t Lose” games.  These are all the teams that didn’t win a bye/double bye in the tournaments.  But that typically also means they are playing a team not likely to make the tournament.  So, this is not the game they can afford to lose.

2:30 pm (ACC) – Pitt can’t afford a loss to Georgia Tech

5:30 pm (Big East) – Seton Hall is likely on the outside looking in, so they certainly can not afford to lose to DePaul.

6:30 pm (Big 10) – Wisconsin can not keep their losing streak alive when their opponent is Ohio State

7 pm (Mt West) – New Mexico’s late season swoon might have already knocked them out of at-large consideration, so they certainly can not afford to lose to Wyoming.

7 pm (Big 12) – While I complained about how the NET has ranked them, that doesn’t change the fact that this is clearly the best conference in the game.  West Virginia is probably locked no matter what, but it would still be better for them not to fall to Texas Tech.

7 pm (ACC) – North Carolina is desperately on the fence – they can’t afford Boston College stopping them from getting a chance at taking on Virginia.

9 pm (Pac 12) – Utah is probably too far down the NET rankings to be considered, but just in case, they certainly can’t lose to Stanford

9:30 pm (Big 12) – Oklahoma State’s resume isn’t as safe as West Virginia’s.  A loss to last place Oklahoma would put them at 17-15 which likely isn’t enough to get an at large bid – even in the Big 12.

9:30 pm (ACC) – Dangerous game for NC State as Virginia Tech is on the fringe edge of the bubble.  The Hokies are certainly good enough to give State some headaches.

11:30 pm (Pac 12) – Arizona State has possibly worked their way back into the field – so they certainly can’t slow down that momentum by losing to Oregon State