Monday is the day that I call the calm before the storm. The power conference tournaments don’t start until Tuesday or Wednesday, and so there are only a few games being played tonight. That certainly doesn’t mean there is nothing at stake – every game happening is a mid-major conference tournament game and so if you lose, your dreams to dance in the tournament are done.

Since I am a little behind, lets first congratulate the teams that have punched their ticket to the dance.

• Long Island University – NEC (although they do play Tuesday night against transitioning Mercyhurst for their conference tournament title).
• Tennessee State – OVC (the regular season co-champ crushed the other co-champ Morehead St 93-67)
• Northern Iowa – MVC (the first 6 seed to win Arch Madness according to the CBS broadcast – they beat UIC 84-69)
• High Point – Big South (the regular season champion beat the runner-up Winthrop 91-76 to reach an incredible 30-4 record)
• Queens – Atlantic Sun (the 3 seed held off an exciting rally by regular season co-champion Central Arkansas to win in overtime 98-93)
• North Dakota State – Summit (the regular season champion defended their spot against in-state rival North Dakota with a 70-62 victory)

For tonight’s viewing guide, there are two more automatic bids getting decided at 7 pm.

• Sun Belt (7 pm ESPN2) – regular season champion Troy (21-11, 12-6) faces off against 10 seed Georgia Southern (21-15, 8-10), who have survived 5 games in 5 days in the brutal gauntlet tournament.
• Southern (7 pm ESPN) – regular season champion East Tennessee State (23-10, 13-5) will try to beat 6 seed Furman (21-12, 10-8) for a third time (they battled to overtime at ETSU before winning by 9 on the road at Furman)

The best games of the night might be the semi-finals of the West Coast Conference, and these will impact the bubble the greatest.

• 12th ranked Gonzaga will play 4th seed Oregon State at 9 pm – if you are a fan of a bubble team, you need Gonzaga to win this game and prevent the Beavers from stealing a bid tomorrow.
• 21st ranked St. Mary’s will play 3rd seed Santa Clara – this game has huge bubble implications. St. Mary’s is probably safe based on their poll ranking – mainly thanks to their upset of Gonzaga at home to claim a share of the WCC regular season title. Santa Clara is getting some attention as one of the last teams in – but their only Quad 1 win is their 8 pt home victory against St. Mary’s in January. Getting to the West Coast Final might be enough for either team to feel safer going into Selection Sunday, while whoever loses will have a long week ahead of watching how the other bubble teams and potential bid stealers perform.

It is a shame – I don’t know that the Lunatic can make it to 2 am EST to watch the big game of the evening. But if you can, it looks like it should be a good one.

Enjoy the games!!!