Garrett Looker is a freshman journalism major and writes 'On the Lookout' for the Daily News. His views do not necessarily agree with those of the newspaper. Write to Garrett at galooker@bsu.edu.
When Ball State students left campus for Spring Break, some of us had an eye on our men’s basketball team. After all, they had tied Central Michigan for the best record in the Western Division of the Mid-American Conference with a 19-13 overall record. They headed into the battleground of a contested conference tournament with the prize of a MAC Title and Ball State’s first trip to the NCAA Tournament since 2000.
The Cardinals were going on to the tournament, but it wasn’t the tournament they were originally hoping for. Ball State’s hopes of grabbing the MAC title and advancing to the "Big Dance" fell to the wayside after a close 49-47 loss to Miami in the first round of tournament play.
So the National Invitational Tournament is where you must be thinking the Cardinals are heading. Well… not exactly.
Apparently, this year was not the year to break yet another drought, a 14-season goose egg in appearances to the NIT.
If you’re confused right now, just hold on. After an unpredictable turnaround season, the Ball State Cardinals accepted a bid in the CollegeInsiders.com Tournament starting March 15. The CIT began in 2009 and is somewhat of a third-tier collegiate basketball postseason tournament.
So what are we doing here in a tournament that most of us have never heard of? Is it a ploy to save face and grab a tournament bid, like what Kentucky did after failing to make the NCAA Tournament in 2013, just after their championship a year before? Or is Ball State’s bid in this year’s CIT something better than that?
The fact is, we are not the Kentucky Wildcats. We do not have many banners hanging from the rafters of Worthen Arena, and the furthest we’ve made it was the Sweet Sixteen back in 1990. But head coach James Whitford and the rest of the Cardinals are looking to change that.
Ball State has to start somewhere when it comes to success, and after two uneventful seasons of 20-plus loss records, Whitford and the Cardinals are looking to make waves in the waters of college basketball. They’ve started the rally with this year’s record of 19-13, the first winning record since 2011.
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None of this changes the fact that many of us don’t know what the CIT is or how it functions as a tournament. All there is to say is, don’t go looking for a bracket to fill out, because there isn’t one. The CIT is a tournament for selected teams that do not make the NCAA or NIT but still meet a list of requirements, including win-loss record, strength of schedule, strength of conference and final 10 games.
Unlike many other tournaments, the CIT does not follow a set bracket format, (sorry bracketologists). The CIT includes five rounds of play, but the teams are rearranged and matched up to different opponents after each win.
Instead of making jokes about what Ball State basketball can’t do, it may be time to start wondering what they can do and what the future holds. The CIT may not seem like much, but it is Ball State’s first postseason appearance since the 2002 NIT. It’s a step in the right direction after only three of the past 15 seasons had winning records (2001, 2002, 2011).
So it’s not the tournament berth that we were all looking for, and we may even say a joke or two about it tomorrow, but maybe this is the beginning of a great period in Ball State men’s basketball. Look out Kentucky, we’ll rise a banner from the rafters of Worthen before you know it… like the College Insiders Tournament Banner.
Ball State men’s basketball team will travel to Nashville to play Tennessee State at 8 p.m. March 15. The game will stream live on SideArmSports.
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