Tuesday night was a relatively chalky night by NIT standards, but more upsets did emerge last night. Despite falling behind by 10 points at Alabama at halftime, Norfolk State started the second half on a furious run and eventually extended their game into overtime where they beat Alabama by a single point. Wichita State and Harvard also pulled off road wins against Furman and Georgetown, respectively – those are results that aren’t necessarily upsets based on what we saw during the regular season. The other three home teams (TCU, Xavier and Nebraska) got off to slow starts in the first half before eventually pulling away in the 2nd half to advance to Round 2 this weekend. (Stat line of the night – Xavier’s Naji Marshall going off for 20 points and 21 rebounds. It was the first time since David West in 2001 that a Xavier played pulled off a 20-20 game.)
The game of the day was Stony Brook-South Florida; the Seawolves jumped out to a 25-point lead in the first half before South Florida mounted a furious comeback in the 2nd half. They tied the game at the 6-minute mark of the 2nd half and eventually won in overtime to advance to the 2nd round of the CBI. Loyola Marymount was the only road team that won; they got a game-winning 3-point play from Mattias Markusson with 31 seconds left to give them a win against Cal Baptist. All the other home teams (West Virginia, Coastal Carolina, Longwood, Brown and DePaul) won their opening games.
There was also a mild surprise in the Hugh Durham Classic in the CIT – Green Bay went on the road to East Tennessee State and beat the Bucs thanks to a 29-point performance from Sandy Cohen III. UTRGV beat Grambling at home for their first ever postseason victory of any kind, and the other road teams (Texas Southern and Presbyterian) picked up wins against New Orleans and Seattle, respectively.
SAINT FRANCIS-BROOKLYN AT HAMPTON (7:00 PM, WatchCIT.com) – This is the John McLendon Classic – this features a Hampton team that had a winning season in their first season in the Big South. While they lost in the Big South quarterfinals to Campbell, St. Francis-Brooklyn is coming off of a tough OT loss to Robert Morris in the NEC quarterfinals.
FLORIDA ATLANTIC AT CHARLESTON SOUTHERN (7:00 PM, WatchCIT.com) – FAU looked much improved at the beginning of the year with wins at Central Florida, at Illinois and at home against Old Dominion before faltering off into the middle of the C-USA pack. Some notable home wins by CSU included Radford and Gardner-Webb.
KENT STATE AT LOUISIANA-MONROE (8:00 PM, WatchCIT.com) – Kent State does have a flair when it comes to close games – they are 6-0 in games decided by 3 points or less this year. UL-Monroe had wins against both Georgia State and Texas State in Sun Belt play, but they were a very inconsistent team this season.
CAL STATE-BAKERSFIELD AT CAL STATE-FULLERTON (10:00 PM, WatchCIT.com) – This will become a future rivalry in the Big West when Bakersfield moves from the WAC to the Big West in a couple of seasons. While Bakersfield had an early exit in the WAC Tournament, Fullerton advanced to the championship game of the Big West Tournament before getting shellacked by UC-Irvine.