Quarterfinal #1 vs. Wichita State
Thursday, March 4, 2016 12:00 p.m.
Scottrade Center, St. Louis, Mo.

After losing two games in a three game span in early February, the Wichita State Shockers were able to refocus for a final push toward Arch Madness. They’ve won their last five in a row—including a 76-54 win at Loyola on Feb. 24—each in convincing fashion, by an average of 26.4 points. The well-rested Shockers will be tipping off against the Ramblers about 16 hours after the conclusion of Loyola’s 74-66 win over Bradley.

By now, we all know the familiar starters for the Shockers: Fred Van Vleet, Ron Baker, Evan Wessel, Shaquille Morris, and Zach Brown. Van Vleet is the two-time MVC Player of the Year who plays so well against the Ramblers his Wikipedia page picture is dribbling across the “L” at Gentile Arena center court. Baker is a three time MVC first-teamer who smoked the Ramblers for 19 points last time out. The Shockers’ very deep and talented bench—including Anton Grady, Markis McDuffie, Connor Frankamp, Rashard Kelly, Bush Wamukota, Eric Hamilton, and others—could probably finish in the top three or four in the league as a team of their own.

I wanted to look at March Madness history to see if there are any historical precedents to give Ramblers fans any hope for some kind of miracle, but there was a connectivity problem with the databases for the site I use for those numbers. I remember looking up to see if a Thursday team has ever advanced to Saturday, and I think I remember finding two, both in mid-late 1990s. I believe one of them was Bradley in 1996. (To be fully accurate, I think the Thursday rounds were actually on either Wednesday or Friday back then). I’m pretty sure I also remember discovering that #1 seeds were 23-0 in their first games at Arch Madness.

Either bucking history or making history, it’s an even taller order for a team that less than 24 hours ago played a potential season-ending game where only 8 players saw time and four played 32 minutes or more. If this is indeed the last college game for Devon Turk (1189 career points, school record 259 made three pointers), Jeff White ( 312 career assists, just two away from ranking 10th in Loyola history), Montel James (2015-16 MVC 2nd team honoree), and Earl Peterson (2015 CBI Most Valuable Player) let it be memorable and joyous.

Loyola game notes: http://grfx.cstv.com/photos/schools/loy ... 304aaa.pdf

Wichita State game notes: Pending

TV/Streaming video: Comcast SportsNet / ESPN3 outside MVC area http://espn.go.com/watchespn/index/_/id ... tournament

Vegas odds: Shockers by 18.5

You are correct. My understanding is that under the current format, no Thursday team has ever won two games.

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Stranger things have happened. Maybe today will the first. I'll be watching from jury duty

I came home to be able to watch the first half....and both CSN Chicago and Fox Sports Midwest feeds are frozen. Great. Last I saw we were up 4-2, though, so good start

Same here. Going on 8 minutes of nothingness on RCN.

We were up 7-2 at the first MTO

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Wichita has an assload of fans there. Basically a home game for them. Lotta country blumpkins.

We knew a 12-0 run was coming... Nice to see the bold start.

WSU can throw bodies at us all day. They have 40 fouls to give, basically.

Not hitting free throws is a recipe for an absolute blow out.

Gotta make freebies. UGHH.