The Mountain East Basketball Conference Tournament gets underway Wednesday inside of WesBanco Arena in Wheeling and features some of the best teams and players in Division II’s Atlantic Region. It’s survive-and-advance time with more than just conference bragging rights on the line.
NCAA Division II tournament bids are up for grabs, with three women’s teams and four men’s ranked in the Top 10 in the Atlantic Region. The Top 8 advance to the NCAA Regional Tournament. Spots in that tournament will be won and lost, during the next few days.
Factor in the MEC champion gets an automatic qualifying bid to the regional, and each team still alive has something to play for in addition to pride.
It Starts at High Noon
Fittingly the basketball tournament kicks off at noon Wednesday, as the first matchup of the week pits two of the nation’s top rebounders in post players in a rubber match.
Wheeling University sophomore Lily Ritz and Davis & Elkins’ junior Jamiyah Johnson lead the MEC, and all of Division II, in rebounding at 15.4 per game. Both were named first-team all-MEC this week and lead their respective teams in scoring at 21.4 and 19 per game.
In two head-to-head meetings this season, the teams have split. Ritz totaled 36 and 21 in those games, Johnson 25 and 32. At 6-foot-1, Ritz has a slight height advantage on the 5-11 Johnson, but Johnson is built solid and holds the size advantage.
The determining factor in this game likely lies away from its marquee matchup. Wheeling University coach Mike Llanas spoke after Saturday’s loss to West Liberty about needing to get more offensive contribution from his other players. That theme held true in the Cardinals’ loss to the Senators in Wheeling earlier this season.
Ritz had 20 in that game, but no other Cardinal had double figures as Taliah Cashwell’s nine was second highest. The team shot 31 percent from the field in the third quarter and 20 in the fourth. The result was a 68-59 Senators’ win. Wheeling won the road meeting with Cashwell scoring a team-high 21 points, backed by Ritz’s 16 and 15 and 10 from Khira Burton and Jacqui Hinesman, respectively. Lauren Lipscomb just missed double digits with nine.
The Cardinals will need that type of balance to advance to Thursday’s noon meeting with No. 2 Notre Dame. Davis & Elkins, the No. 10 seed in the tournament, is coached by Jason Asbell. Prior to helming the Senators, Asbell was an assistant under Lynn Ullom at West Liberty.
Hilltoppers Peaking at the Right Time?
West Liberty has its own rubber match to contend with when the Hilltoppers take on W.Va. State at 2:15 p.m., a game that will be broadcast on The Watchdog (98.1 FM WKKX). WLU is coming off an impressive win against rival Wheeling on Saturday, preceded by an upset of Notre Dame, the No. 4 team in the Atlantic Region.
Better shot selection and major contributions from the bench have the Hilltoppers looking like the team no one wants to play this week. West Liberty boasts the conference’s top 3-point shooter in senior Morgan Brunner, along with fellow senior and deep threat Taylor Johnson. The pair are the team’s two leading scorers, but earlier in the season, when they got cold, the team faltered.
The first meeting with W.Va. State was an 87-80 loss. West Liberty led at the half as Brunner and Johnson held the ‘Toppers to 11 of 23 from 3-point range in the first half. The team attempted 50 triples that game. The problem? They made only six in the second half shooting 25 percent or less in both quarters. That, coupled with a 31-point, 13-rebound effort from State’s Chloe Cheresne, equaled a loss.
In the second meeting, West Liberty displayed a volume shooting strategy from the outside, but Johnson and point guard Audrey Tingle started attacking the basket more. Add 11 points off the bench from Corinne Thomas, and the 74-68 win was secured.
The bench provided 25 points that game, and coach Kyle Cooper commented Saturday on his team’s greater utilization of its depth as a key in the sudden hot streak. In the last two games, the bench provided more than 20 points.
Men’s Side
Wednesday’s men’s games feature No. 7 W.Va. Wesleyan against No. 10 Urbana at 6 p.m. with No. 8 Concord against No. 9 Notre Dame to follow at 8:15 p.m. Top-seeded and conference regular-season champion West Liberty doesn’t play until Friday at 6 p.m. against the Concord/Notre Dame winner. No. 5 Wheeling faces No. 4 W.Va. State at 8:15 p.m.
The Hilltoppers are currently No. 2 in the Atlantic and will likely make the NCAA tournament even with an untimely first-round exit. Ranked No. 13 nationally, West Liberty (24-4) is riding a seven-game winning streak, dating back to a 96-93 loss on the road to the Yellowjackets.
West Liberty’s potent offense leads Division II in scoring at 104 points per game. The Hilltoppers boast three of the conference’s top six scorers in Dalton Bolton (third, 19.5), Pat Robinson III (fourth, 18.6) and Will Yoakum (sixth, 18.2). The Hilltoppers are also the MEC’s top rebounding team on both ends of the floor.
The Cardinals have struggled a bit as of late, losing four of their last six. They’ve also split with State, losing 97-92 on the road at Institute back in December and winning 87-78 in Wheeling last month.
That game saw the Cardinals receive 26 points from leading scorer Jordan Reid in a balanced effort with four players hitting for double figures and two more accounting for at least six. Not lost in the stats is the 22-4 bench-scoring advantage Wheeling owned.
That was a far cry from the 24-bench points State supplied in the first meeting, 19 of which came from the hot hand of Treohn Watkins. Another key stat in the Cardinals’ loss was that the team’s 19 turnovers led directly to 31 points for the Yellowjackets.
State is the conference’s second-leading scoring team behind West Lib while Wheeling boasts the third-ranked scoring defense. Reid is ninth in the MEC at 17.8 points per game. He’s aided by Jarrett Haines’ 15.3 and Emmanuel Ansong’s 14.5 averages.
Should Wheeling and West Liberty both advance, it sets up a rivalry faceoff in the semifinals with a spot in Sunday’s title-game finale on the line.
