Missouri State

ST. LOUIS -- UNI (25-5, 14-4) is the State Farm MVC Tournament top seed after earning the league's regular-season men's basketball title for the first time since 2010.  Notably, it marks the third regular-season crown for the Panthers, which also won an outright title in 2009-10 and a shared crown in 2008-09.

Printable Bracket (PDF)

This marks the third time UNI has been the top seed at Arch Madness.  In the previous two (2009 and 2010), the Panthers claimed titles and the league's automatic NCAA berth.  UNI also has MVC Tournament titles in 2004, 2015 and 2016.  UNI head coach Ben Jacobson enters this year's tournament with a 16-9 all-time record at Arch Madness with four crowns.  The 16 wins rank third all-time in MVC history, while the four titles trail only the six championships earned by Dana Altman (Creighton).  Altman's 21 all-time tourney wins is the league record.

There were two ties in the standings that required the league to utilize its secondary tiebreaker.  Indiana State and Bradley split their series this year and tied for third place with identical 11-7 records.  The Sycamores won the tiebreaker and the No. 3 seed by virtue of a better NET (NCAA Evaluation Tool) rating.  ISU's rating is 100, and Bradley is at 112.  Missouri State and Valparaiso also split their regular-season series and tied for sixth with identical 9-9 league records.  MSU won the tiebreaker and the No. 6 seed as it held a better NET rating than Valpo's (122 to 135).  

This year's tournament is the 44th MVC post-season tourney and 30th-straight in St. Louis.  Only the Big East Conference, which is celebrating 41-straight years in New York, has had a longer continuous run at the same neutral site for its conference men's basketball championship.  Notably, this marks the fourth tournament in 30 seasons in St. Louis in which a team with a 9-9 record played in the opening round.  Bradley (1998), Drake (2012), Illinois State (2019) and Valpo this year are the only teams to finish .500 and play on the tourney's first day.   Bradley, Drake and Illinois State each won their first-round game in their respective years.

Since the league expanded to its current 10-team format in 1997, only one team that has played in the opening round has reached the semifinals (won twice). Bradley, seeded No. 7 in 1998 (with a 9-9 league record), beat No. 10 Drake and then upset No. 2 Creighton, before falling in the semifinals to Missouri State. No team to play in the MVC Tournament Opening Round (Thursday) has advanced to the title game.

The top seed has won the title nine times in St. Louis in 29 years, just six times in the past 12 tries and only once since 2014 (Drake-2008, UNI-2009, UNI-2010, Creighton-2013, Wichita State-2014, and Loyola-2018).  Notably, only four times has a seed worse than No. 3 won the tournament (No. 4 Creighton in 2000, No. 4 UNI in 2016, No. 5 Indiana State in 2001, and No. 5 Bradley last year).  The tourney's top two seeds are a combined 57-1 in their first games in the 29 years in St. Louis.  Of current members, Southern Illinois and UNI own the most tournament titles, with five each.  Other current members who have won an MVC Tournament title include Bradley (3), Drake (1), Illinois State (4), Indiana State (3), Loyola Chicago (1) and Missouri State (1).

The tournament features nine games in four days, beginning Thursday, March 5, and ending Sunday, March 8.  Six of the nine games of the tournament will be available through regional cable networks via linear distribution and ESPN+ via digital delivery (with some blackout restrictions).  The semifinals will be shown on CBS Sports Network for the fifth-consecutive year, while the championship game will be cleared nationally on CBS Sports for the 15th-straight year.

On radio, all nine games will air in the St. Louis metro area.  KTRS Radio 550 AM will carry all games but the semifinals (Saturday), which will be cleared on KFNS 590 AM.  The title game will also air on Sirius XM.

Thirty-nine of 43 previous tournament champions were seeded 1, 2, or 3.  The top two seeds have had the most success, winning a combined 32 times, and the top two seeds have won 19 titles in St. Louis (in 29 total tries). The last 14 MVC tournament champions have consisted of six top seeds, five No. 2 seeds, a No. 3 seed, a No. 4 seed and a No. 5.