Give me Liberty or give me death.
The Liberty Flames are headed back to the NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament after yesterday's 73-57 win over Lipscomb in the championship game of the Atlantic Sun tournament.
Under the direction of head coach Ritchie McKay, Liberty will be competing in its ninth tournament game over the past four seasons.
That's six games in the CollegeInsider.com Tournament (CIT) in 2017 and 2018 and two historic games last season in the Big Dance.
The Flames finished 29-4 this season after a wildly-successful 29-7 campaign last season.
Consider Ritchie McKay's coaching career a re-birth, if you will, at one of the largest Christian universities in the world.
Liberty University served as a sort of "wellness retreat" for McKay after rocky results at four basketball programs that rarely appear in the sports headlines, let alone the NCAA tournament.
McKay started his head coaching career in 1996 at Portland State, moved to Colorado State, upgraded to Oregon State and then landed at New Mexico where the Lobos made the 2005 NCAA tournament led by future NBA forward Danny Granger.
The do-everything Granger finished as runner-up to Utah's Andrew Bogut in Mountain West Conference Player of the Year voting during the 2004-05 season.
Granger single-handedly led the Lobos to the 2005 NCAA tournament but the team froze in the opening-round spotlight when trailing Villanova, 34-11, at halftime.
The listless effort and eventual loss in such a high-profile game was the beginning of the end for McKay in Albuquerque.
Disappointed Lobo fans called the city's largest sports radio station (KKOB - 770 AM) to recite a list of McKay's poor coaching decisions, numerous recruiting failures and horrible road record (8-42).
Soon, influential boosters stopped supporting the program financially and attendance at The Pit dropped precipitously.
Arenas boasting a capacity of 18,000-plus are a double-edged sword for those in the coaching profession.
The head coach obviously owns the program and the college town when his team wins before a full house.
But on the flip side, losing head coaches become the village idiot when there are more empty seats than occupied ones.
In the spring of 2007, newly-hired U.N.M. athletic director Paul Krebs bid "Adios" to his head coach.
At age 41, McKay was unemployed after once being considered a rising star in the profession.
The faith-based McKay then made a wise decision when Liberty University came calling.
To some, it looked like a major step down in class because Liberty was exiting an 8-24 season and ranked as the second-youngest school in Division I (Florida Gulf Coast is the youngest, founded in 1991).
It would be McKay's fifth head coaching job in a 12-year span but it was the assignment he accepted two seasons after arriving at Liberty that would completely change his basketball fortunes.
Tony Bennett, a longtime friend and mentor, offered McKay the position of associate head coach at nearby University of Virginia and McKay shrewdly jumped at the opportunity.
McKay felt it was better to play "wingman" at a potential ACC basketball power than pilot a school where basketball was important but not essential.
And he was right.
The six years spent alongside Tony Bennett at Virginia served as a masters course in running a basketball program.
McKay was able to refine his leadership skills and define his overall philosophy without the outside pressures (think media, boosters, administration, etc.) associated with basketball outcomes.
After his productive time in Charlottesville, McKay was ready to return to Lynchburg in 2015 for a second stint as head basketball coach at Liberty University.
How fitting that in the same year Tony Bennett led his Virginia Cavaliers to college basketball's biggest prize, Ritchie McKay beat out Bennett to win the 2019 Jim Phelan Award, an honor accorded annually to the nation's top Division I head coach.
FIVE IN, 63 TO GO.....Selection Sunday is less than one week away.
Here's a thumbnail sketch of the five college basketball teams, listed alphabetically, that have automatically qualified for the NCAA tournament by winning conference tournament championships:
BELMONT - The Bruins enter the tourney on a 12-game winning streak.
Back-to-back road losses to conference rivals Murray State and Austin Peay in late January ultimately re-focused first-year head coach Casey Alexander's team.
Here's the key to Belmont: The Bruins played three games against fast-paced Eastern Kentucky and posted three convincing victories by margins of 10, 23 and 31.
The Bruins can play fast or slow, but they look better in an up-tempo game.
The Ohio Valley Conference champs have a variety of ways to score the basketball, a necessary characteristic of teams that engineer first-round upsets.
BRADLEY - The Missouri Valley Conference tournament bracket broke beautifully for the Braves when both top-seeded Northern Iowa and second-seeded Loyola were upset in earlier rounds.
Third-seeded Bradley went 0-4 this season against the top two teams in the MVC.
The Braves trailed Valpo by six points with less than 15 minutes remaining in yesterday's title game before the Crusaders simply ran out of gas when playing their fourth game in as many days.
Bradley lost to Michigan State last season in first-round NCAA tourney action as 17.5-point underdogs.
Final score: MSU 76 Bradley 65.
The Spartans won the game but the Braves easily cashed the bet.
ESPN bracketologist Joe Lunardi paired Michigan State and Bradley in today's edition of his 2020 mock bracket.
Highly improbable.
LIBERTY - The betting market finally caught up to Ritchie McKay's team this season.
The Flames are better defensively than last season but they sometimes stall offensively.
Like big brother Virginia, Liberty plays at a snail's pace.
Liberty last season died a point-spread hero (2-0 ATS) in last year's tournament when eliminating Mississippi State as a 7-point underdog and losing by nine to classy Virginia Tech as a 9.5-point 'dog.
A-Sun Player of the Year Caleb Homesley is the guy to watch when the shot clock is running down.
His Twitter handle (@get_buckets05) hints at the mentality of this offensive-talented 6-foot-6 lefty.
Underrated Elijah Cuffee serves as the team's defensive stopper, a critical quality sometimes overlooked in March postseason play.
UTAH STATE - A band of brothers.
That was the label given to Utah State's 2018-19 squad by head coach Craig Smith after the Aggies lost 78-61 to a more athletic Washington team in the first round of the NCAA tournament.
USU will be out to make amends this season.
Most of the key players are back, including Sam Merrill, who scored 27 of his team's 59 points in a mild upset over San Diego State last Saturday in Las Vegas.
The Aggies are a veteran squad led by Merrill, who turns 24 in May.
WINTHROP - This is the only team in the quintet to avoid betting in first-round action.
The 2020 Big South tournament winners obviously are not as good as Winthrop teams during the Greg Marshall era (Winthop earned a #7 seed in the 2007 tourney), but Pat Kelsey's team showed poise and determination this season after starting 4-7 against a tough nonconference slate.
Two problems for the Eagles: 1) They play fast, rarely a positive when facing a top-seeded team in the tourney, and 2) They enter the tournament as the worst free-throw shooting team (less than 64%) in the field.
Don't search for any former Winthrop players who have competed in the NBA.
There are none.
The Liberty Flames are headed back to the NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament after yesterday's 73-57 win over Lipscomb in the championship game of the Atlantic Sun tournament.
Under the direction of head coach Ritchie McKay, Liberty will be competing in its ninth tournament game over the past four seasons.
That's six games in the CollegeInsider.com Tournament (CIT) in 2017 and 2018 and two historic games last season in the Big Dance.
The Flames finished 29-4 this season after a wildly-successful 29-7 campaign last season.
Consider Ritchie McKay's coaching career a re-birth, if you will, at one of the largest Christian universities in the world.
Liberty University served as a sort of "wellness retreat" for McKay after rocky results at four basketball programs that rarely appear in the sports headlines, let alone the NCAA tournament.
McKay started his head coaching career in 1996 at Portland State, moved to Colorado State, upgraded to Oregon State and then landed at New Mexico where the Lobos made the 2005 NCAA tournament led by future NBA forward Danny Granger.
The do-everything Granger finished as runner-up to Utah's Andrew Bogut in Mountain West Conference Player of the Year voting during the 2004-05 season.
Granger single-handedly led the Lobos to the 2005 NCAA tournament but the team froze in the opening-round spotlight when trailing Villanova, 34-11, at halftime.
The listless effort and eventual loss in such a high-profile game was the beginning of the end for McKay in Albuquerque.
Disappointed Lobo fans called the city's largest sports radio station (KKOB - 770 AM) to recite a list of McKay's poor coaching decisions, numerous recruiting failures and horrible road record (8-42).
Soon, influential boosters stopped supporting the program financially and attendance at The Pit dropped precipitously.
Arenas boasting a capacity of 18,000-plus are a double-edged sword for those in the coaching profession.
The head coach obviously owns the program and the college town when his team wins before a full house.
But on the flip side, losing head coaches become the village idiot when there are more empty seats than occupied ones.
In the spring of 2007, newly-hired U.N.M. athletic director Paul Krebs bid "Adios" to his head coach.
At age 41, McKay was unemployed after once being considered a rising star in the profession.
The faith-based McKay then made a wise decision when Liberty University came calling.
To some, it looked like a major step down in class because Liberty was exiting an 8-24 season and ranked as the second-youngest school in Division I (Florida Gulf Coast is the youngest, founded in 1991).
It would be McKay's fifth head coaching job in a 12-year span but it was the assignment he accepted two seasons after arriving at Liberty that would completely change his basketball fortunes.
Tony Bennett, a longtime friend and mentor, offered McKay the position of associate head coach at nearby University of Virginia and McKay shrewdly jumped at the opportunity.
McKay felt it was better to play "wingman" at a potential ACC basketball power than pilot a school where basketball was important but not essential.
And he was right.
The six years spent alongside Tony Bennett at Virginia served as a masters course in running a basketball program.
McKay was able to refine his leadership skills and define his overall philosophy without the outside pressures (think media, boosters, administration, etc.) associated with basketball outcomes.
After his productive time in Charlottesville, McKay was ready to return to Lynchburg in 2015 for a second stint as head basketball coach at Liberty University.
How fitting that in the same year Tony Bennett led his Virginia Cavaliers to college basketball's biggest prize, Ritchie McKay beat out Bennett to win the 2019 Jim Phelan Award, an honor accorded annually to the nation's top Division I head coach.
FIVE IN, 63 TO GO.....Selection Sunday is less than one week away.
Here's a thumbnail sketch of the five college basketball teams, listed alphabetically, that have automatically qualified for the NCAA tournament by winning conference tournament championships:
BELMONT - The Bruins enter the tourney on a 12-game winning streak.
Back-to-back road losses to conference rivals Murray State and Austin Peay in late January ultimately re-focused first-year head coach Casey Alexander's team.
Here's the key to Belmont: The Bruins played three games against fast-paced Eastern Kentucky and posted three convincing victories by margins of 10, 23 and 31.
The Bruins can play fast or slow, but they look better in an up-tempo game.
The Ohio Valley Conference champs have a variety of ways to score the basketball, a necessary characteristic of teams that engineer first-round upsets.
BRADLEY - The Missouri Valley Conference tournament bracket broke beautifully for the Braves when both top-seeded Northern Iowa and second-seeded Loyola were upset in earlier rounds.
Third-seeded Bradley went 0-4 this season against the top two teams in the MVC.
The Braves trailed Valpo by six points with less than 15 minutes remaining in yesterday's title game before the Crusaders simply ran out of gas when playing their fourth game in as many days.
Bradley lost to Michigan State last season in first-round NCAA tourney action as 17.5-point underdogs.
Final score: MSU 76 Bradley 65.
The Spartans won the game but the Braves easily cashed the bet.
ESPN bracketologist Joe Lunardi paired Michigan State and Bradley in today's edition of his 2020 mock bracket.
Highly improbable.
LIBERTY - The betting market finally caught up to Ritchie McKay's team this season.
The Flames are better defensively than last season but they sometimes stall offensively.
Like big brother Virginia, Liberty plays at a snail's pace.
Liberty last season died a point-spread hero (2-0 ATS) in last year's tournament when eliminating Mississippi State as a 7-point underdog and losing by nine to classy Virginia Tech as a 9.5-point 'dog.
A-Sun Player of the Year Caleb Homesley is the guy to watch when the shot clock is running down.
His Twitter handle (@get_buckets05) hints at the mentality of this offensive-talented 6-foot-6 lefty.
Underrated Elijah Cuffee serves as the team's defensive stopper, a critical quality sometimes overlooked in March postseason play.
UTAH STATE - A band of brothers.
That was the label given to Utah State's 2018-19 squad by head coach Craig Smith after the Aggies lost 78-61 to a more athletic Washington team in the first round of the NCAA tournament.
USU will be out to make amends this season.
Most of the key players are back, including Sam Merrill, who scored 27 of his team's 59 points in a mild upset over San Diego State last Saturday in Las Vegas.
The Aggies are a veteran squad led by Merrill, who turns 24 in May.
WINTHROP - This is the only team in the quintet to avoid betting in first-round action.
The 2020 Big South tournament winners obviously are not as good as Winthrop teams during the Greg Marshall era (Winthop earned a #7 seed in the 2007 tourney), but Pat Kelsey's team showed poise and determination this season after starting 4-7 against a tough nonconference slate.
Two problems for the Eagles: 1) They play fast, rarely a positive when facing a top-seeded team in the tourney, and 2) They enter the tournament as the worst free-throw shooting team (less than 64%) in the field.
Don't search for any former Winthrop players who have competed in the NBA.
There are none.
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