Under The Radar Postseason News, Notes and Highlighted Games – Wednesday, March 22

Yesterday, there were a pair of head coaching vacancies filled in the Atlantic 10 Conference. First was the VCU opening – it lasted less than 24 hours after Will Wade announced that he would resign to take the head coaching position at LSU. They stayed within the family and hired Rice head coach Mike Rhoades (a former Shaka Smart assistant) to their open position.

Elsewhere in the A-10, UMass announced that now-former Winthrop head coach Pat Kelsey will be their new head coach – he replaces Derek Kellogg. Kelsey does have ties to the A-10 from his playing and coaching days with the Xavier program.

As far as postsesaon games go, only 2 games were played last night in the NIT. The first game saw TCU withstand a 33-point performance from Richmond star TJ Cline. He had little support in TCU’s 86-68 victory over the Spiders. Jamie Dixon will be returning to familiar territory at Madison Square Garden from his days at Pitt. Georgia Tech will also join the NIT Final 4 thanks to their 74-66 victory at Ole Miss last night.

NIT

(2) ILLINOIS at (4) CENTRAL FLORIDA (7:00 PM, ESPN2). Illinois is the highest seeded team remaining in the NIT, but they are unable to host this game due to scheduling conflicts at the State Farm Center. Therefore, UCF will get to play host to the Illini tonight for the right to advance to the semifinals in Madison Square Garden. Dawkins is also no stranger to the Garden in March – his Stanford teams won a pair of NIT titles in 2012 and 2015, respectively.

(8) CAL STATE BAKERSFIELD at (6) TEXAS-ARLINGTON (9:00 PM, ESPNU). This would definitely have been a feature UTR Game of the Day had this been scheduled earlier in the season, but better late than never with both the Roadrunners and Mavericks involved in playing for the final spot in the NIT semifinals.

CBI

ILLINOIS-CHICAGO at COASTAL CAROLINA (7:00 PM). In what can be unofficially described as the CBI Eastern Conference final, a pair of former NCAA Tournament coaches go head-to-head. Cliff Ellis (Coastal Carolina) had prior tournament runs with Clemson and Auburn and Steve McClain (UIC) had a run with Wyoming in 2002 that included an upset of Gonzaga in the NCAA Tournament that season. The winner advances to the Best-of-3 CBI finals.

UTAH VALLEY at WYOMING (9:00 PM). The Front Range will play host to the unofficial Western half of the CBI bracket. Utah Valley is coming off of a pair of road wins against Georgia Southern and Rice to advance to this point. Should they beat Wyoming on the road tonight, they are assured of at least hosting one game in the best-of-3 CBI finals to be played next week.

CIT

IDAHO at TEXAS STATE (8:00 PM, Facebook Live). This will be the last of the 2nd round games in the CIT that will take place tonight. Idaho has the biggest star power in this one (at least in our minds) with Victor Sanders and the Sherwood twins, but Texas State has been a tough out since their surprise trip to the Sun Belt championship game a week and a half ago.