College

Big East Tournament Pits Local Teams Against Each Other

The Big East Tournament pits all the local teams against each other. Can Seton Hall or Rutgers pull off a couple upsets? Will St. John’s prove it belongs in the conversation with the big boys of the Big East? Will Syracuse make one of it’s usual deep runs?

by
Staff Post
March 7, 2011

There are four Big East teams located in New York and New Jersey. Rutgers, Syracuse, St. John’s, and Seton Hall. All four teams find themselves in the same bracket as the Big East Men’s Basketball Tournament begins tomorrow.

Syracuse, the No. 4 seed, earned two byes and will wait until the quarterfinals before stepping on the court for game action. St. John’s is the No. 5 seed and has a first round bye.

No. 12 Seton Hall and No. 13 Rutgers will square off in a first round matchup at 2pm EST Tuesday afternoon at Madison Square Garden. The winner moves on to play St. John’s, with the winner of that game going up against Syracuse.

Seton Hall and Rutgers split their two meetings between the schools this season. Both games were hard fought with final scores in the 60’s. Neither game was decided by more than six points. The road team won each of those contests.

The Pirates seem to be on a roll of late, entering the tournament with back-to-back impressive wins over St. John’s and Marquette.

Rutgers enters the tournament losers of five of their last six games. The only win was a 68-64 victory over DePaul.

The Scarlet Knights will need to find some offense if they want to make any kind of run. Rutgers has shown flashes of brilliant defense and at times can score, however those times still seem few and far between.

The Syracuse Orange have been up and down this season but still managed to hold onto the No. 4 seed for the conference tournament. The ‘Cuse relies on their trademark zone defense.

St. John’s is one of the surprise teams in the league this season. Head coach Steve Lavin and the “Johnnies” are an athletic, deep team that can play with anyone in the conference and country. While they have had a successful season, there has been some disappointing losses, especially of late when they fell to Seton Hall. Playing close to home could help as you can expect a favorable crowd.

This bracket pits all the local teams against each other. Can Seton Hall or Rutgers pull off a couple upsets? Will St. John’s prove it belongs in the conversation with the big boys of the Big East? Will Syracuse make one of it’s usual deep runs?

Those questions will begin to be answered starting tomorrow at Madison Square Garden.