Tops play Drake in first round of tournament

Fittingly, it was senior guard Courtney Lee who launched the ball toward the rafters of the Mitchell Center as the buzzer sounded on Western’s 67-57 victory over Middle Tennessee State in the Sun Belt Conference Tournament Championship to earn an automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament.

And that’s where we pick up the rest of the story.

Sunday night, with fans gathered at Diddle Arena, the Toppers found out they would be the 12th seed in the west region and play the No. 5-seeded Drake Bulldogs at 11:30 a.m. Friday at the St. Petersburg Times Forum in Tampa, Fla.

“Once it goes up on the screen, it’s real, no question,” coach Darrin Horn said. “It kind of changes your mindset from enjoying it and looking forward to it, to time to do it.”

Drake brings plenty of storylines to Tampa this weekend. The Bulldogs stole the national spotlight after they were picked in the preseason to finish ninth in the Missouri Valley Conference and then posted a 28-4 record and are currently ranked 14th. They also won the regular season and tournament in the Missouri Valley.

While the Toppers bring experience and depth to the table, the Bulldogs bring something of a “Mighty Ducks” storyline. Junior forward Jonathan Cox and Missouri Valley Conference Player of the Year Adam Emmenecker, a senior guard, are former walk-ons in the Bulldog’s starting lineup. They’re being led by first-year head coach Keno Davis, son of former head coach Tom Davis.

Western makes its first trip to the NCAA Tournament since 2003, and the first in the Horn era.

“We’re never going to be satisfied,” senior guard Ty Rogers said. “As seniors, we’re not ready to quit playing basketball, so that means we’ve got to keep winning and we’re going to do everything we can to keep it rolling.”

The Toppers will come into Friday’s game after a 10-day layoff, the longest time they’ve had between games this season.

“The coaches did a good job of keeping our minds elsewhere and just make us focus on getting better,” senior guard Tyrone Brazelton said.

Because Drake has been such a surprise this season, they’ve garnered more of the earlier national attention this week.

“I think we are playing really well right now,” Horn said. “But I’m not so sure our best basketball is not coming this week. This is a group that has desired so badly to be in the tournament that there were times that as a group and individuals just weren’t as sharp as they could be. There is not a lot of pressure on us now. We can just go out and play and hopefully that will help us.”

The last Western victory in the NCAA Tournament was a 82-76 overtime victory against Michigan. Horn was a player in that game, scoring 13 points.

Horn said there is no question this is what college basketball is all about.

“This is the reason you spend 20 days away from home in July recruiting if you’re a coach, and stay up until 3 or 4 in the morning watching film,” Horn said. “If you’re a player, why you put up with the coaches and the practices that you wonder ‘why am I doing this.’”

Get updates and more stories from Tampa, Fla., all weekend long at wkuherald.com.

Reach Andrew Robinson at sports@chherald.com.

Lady Toppers prepare for NCAA tournament

As the women’s NCAA Tournament selection show went on, sophomore guard Kenzie Rich said she was getting a little impatient.

“I wasn’t worried when the names were coming up because I knew we were in,” Rich said. “But we were the very last ones, and I was like ‘Just do it already, just put our name up there.’”

The committee did put the Lady Toppers’ name up there, as the 10-seed in the Spokane region facing off against the seventh-seeded Texas El-Paso.

Western was given an automatic bid and a guarantee to be in its first NCAA tournament appearance since 2003, after winning the Sun Belt Conference Championship Tournament on March 11.

UTEP is having its most sucessful season in the school’s history. Before losing to Southern Methodist in the Conference USA finals, the Miners were riding a 23-game winning streak, the longest in the country.

Their season was strong enough to get them into their first NCAA bid in school history. The school has never made it to post-conference tournament play.

They finished the season 27-3, including going undefeated in Conference USA.

The Miners have four players averaging double-figure scoring. They are led by sophomore guard Jareica Hughes, who averages 14.7 points a game.

In the frontcourt, UTEP has several players who can play in the post and beyond the three-point line.

Senior Izabela Piekarska, the Miners’ starting center, leads the team in three-point percentage, making 39 percent of her shots from beyond the arc.

UTEP is second in Conference USA in three-point percentage, making 33 percent of its three-pointers.

Western leads the Sun Belt in defending the three-pointer, holding opponents to .274 percent from three-point range.

After studying UTEP, coach Mary Taylor Cowles said that the Miners offense has been a key to their success.

“I don’t think you win as many games as they have won without a pretty agressive attack,” Cowles said. “There is a nice balanced attack coming from UTEP. They’ve had a lot of sucess this year which I’m sure from a confidence standpoint has beenn very positive for them.”

Senior forward Crystal Kelly said her the team is confident in its chances to advance past the first round of the tournament for the first time since 2000.

“We definitely think we have a great chance of winning this game and advancing to the next round,” Kelly said. “We’re in better shape, and our inside game as well as our perimeter game is much better.”

The Lady Toppers are riding a wave of momentum after their victory in the conference tournament.

Western defeated North Texas, Arkansas State and Middle Tennessee by an average of 12.7 points in the tournament.

Kelly, Rich and freshman forward Arnika Brown made the Sun Belt all-tournament team. Junior Dominique Duck was named tournament MVP for her performance, averaging 17 points a game during the tournament.

The Lady Toppers open the tournament at 10:30 p.m. in the Maples Pavilion in Stanford, Calif.

Get updates and more stories from Stanford, Calif., all weekend long at wkuherald.com.

Reach Chris Acree at sports@chherald.com.