Last Wednesday Texas A&M Corpus-Christi had a 75-71 win over Northwestern State in the Southland tourney title game to earn an automatic bid to next week’s NCAA tournament. The Islanders started 4-3 in conference play but won 12 of their final 13 games to earn the school’s 2nd straight NCAA tourney bid. In addition to shining a light on the players who got the job done on the court, it is also important to recognize the spirited students who have worked just as hard on the sidelines, such as band members/cheerleaders/dancers. Earlier today HoopsHD’s Jon Teitel got to speak with Texas A&M Corpus-Christi cheerleader Gabby Solis about going into nursing.
You are from Edinburg, TX: what made you choose Texas A&M Corpus-Christi? I grew up around South Padre Island so something about the beach kept me close to here. It is a very good college town.
You are a nursing major: how did you choose that subject? I have always known since I was little that I wanted to work in health care. It seems like nurses have the most interaction with patients, which is the most near and dear to my heart.
What is the post-graduation plan? I graduate in May and am really excited. I am planning to become a neonatal ICU nurse and will move home to begin my future career.
You have been a cheerleader for most of your life: how did you 1st get into it, and what is the best part? I have been doing it for pretty much 18 years. It blows my mind that my 22-year old body can still do it but it is a great sisterhood and helps keep me busy/active. I love being a part of the spirit program and supporting our teams at all of their games.
1 of your hobbies is trying new restaurants: what is your favorite kind of food? I am a pretty plain-Jane girl so I am a die-hard chicken tenders fan!
What has been your favorite moment so far this season: your 8-game winning streak in January/February, winning the regular season finale in OT, Senior Night, other? The conference tourney was an amazing weekend with a whirlwind of events. 1 of the best games was our homecoming game when we won the regular season title: to get to share it with the community was a really great experience.
Last Wednesday in the Southland tourney title game your team had a 4-PT win over Northwestern State: what has the reaction been like since you returned to campus? It has been really exciting to have the support from the entire university/community. There will be a lot of watch parties on the island, which is such a great feeling. The vibe for Selection Sunday is great: everyone cannot wait to see where/who we will be playing!
How does your school decide who gets to go to the NCAA tourney, and what will it mean to you to see your group doing its thing in front of a national TV audience? We participate in tryouts because they only allow 12 spirit members at the tourney. Our coaches rate us on our skills and I was gratefully given the opportunity. It is exciting to get that exposure on TV. I received so many notifications this week from friends/family who saw me on TV: what a way to go out with a bang as a senior!
Does your squad have anything extra-special planned for the NCAA tourney? Not really: we will just be prepared for the NCAA tourney by having some extra practices, and will attend Selection Sunday in support of our team.
Any predictions for the Islanders next week? We have the biggest support for our team and hope we can win that 1st game. We are getting better and better each year so even though we fell short last year (a 9-PT loss to Texas Southern) hopefully we can keep it going this year.
The Hoops HD Selection Committee – Friday Night Update
Tonight was the second night that the Hoops HD Selection Committee met via Zoom conference call to begin seeding the top of the NCAA Tournament at-large field. As of Friday evening, we had 51 teams in the field at that stage; there were 14 auto-bid winners (including Gonzaga) plus 37 at-large teams. The reason there were 37 was because we had 29 teams make the field on our first ballot plus 8 teams that were voted in on Thursday.
Keep in mind that at-large bids are guaranteed to open up in the Big 12 and the Big East; more bids will open up in the ACC with Duke and Virginia slated to meet in the ACC Championship as well as in the Pac-12 with UCLA and Arizona meeting in the Pac-12 championship.. As of the time this was written, the SEC has not opened up (although that would change if our Committee were to vote in Vanderbilt to the at-large pool). The American could open up tomorrow should Memphis and Houston meet in the conference championship game. We elected not to vote any at-large bids in tonight, nor for any contingencies that could arise. The Big Ten has Ohio State threatening to become a bid thief now that they’ve advanced to the semifinal round against Purdue. The Mountain West would open up should San Diego State win their conference tournament OR if either Utah State gets voted in as an at-large AND wins the conference tournament.
As for what we actually did, we began the process of seeding by submitting a list of our top 12 teams on the board to Chad Sherwood (NOT including teams Under Consideration). Once the process was complete, we individually ranked the Top 12 teams 1 through 12. The top eight vote-getters were added to the first 2 lines of the field; the remaining 4 teams carried over to the next round of voting. (The real NCAA Committee would submit a list of Top 8 teams and then rank the teams 1 through 8 as they add 1 line at a time to the field). After the first two lines were complete, we then again repeated the process of nominating 12 teams individually for tabulation. The top 8 teams would then be paired with the four carryover teams and would be ranked 1 through 12. The top 8 teams were added to the next set of seedlines (3 and 4). We repeated the process for the 5 and 6-lines and added only the 7-line afterwards since we did not have enough teams to add the 8-line at this time.
This is how our board looked at this stage:
On the at-large board, note the four teams in red (Arkansas, Florida Atlantic, Illinois and Iowa) are carryover teams and will be included in the next round of voting tomorrow night as we continue to build the seed list. This is NOT to be confused with the four teams highlighted in red on the Under Consideration board (Mississippi State, NC State, Providence and Rutgers); these were carryover teams for the purpose of nominating teams to the at-large board. Also note the teams in orange on the Under Consideration board; these teams have been eliminated from their respective conference tournaments and can no longer add to their profiles. Penn State and Vanderbilt are examples of teams that are still alive and can add more signature wins to their respective profiles (or an automatic bid).
Tomorrow night will be our longest night of the weekend; we will then vote in the last remaining at-large teams plus any contigency teams. We will also finish seeding the rest of the field and do an initial scrub of the seedlist to account for results through Saturday night.