TAMPA, Fla. — The Blog's west-central Florida odyssey lives on for another day.
Today, Mississippi State faces Tennessee at noon CT for the SEC Tournament championship.
But before we get to that, let's take a look back to Saturday's semifinal win over LSU:
• To get to Sunday, the Bulldogs had to get past an old nemesis. Check.
• In this expansive notebook, MSU dismisses the notion that fatigue will play a factor today. (Worth noting, though not noted in the online edition, is that The David Brandt contributed to this notebook.)
• Photographic evidence of Saturday's win.
• Wayne Chism and Tennessee provide today's competition.
Today, Mississippi State faces a team that it lost to Feb. 25 in Knoxville. The final score was 81-76, but State led by eight in the first half before getting rattled and committing some big-time turnovers. The game was close in the final minutes but Tennessee hit its free throws and held on to win. Oh, and some guy named Scotty Hopson had a big day for UT, too. That was the start of a three-game winning streak for Tennessee and came in the middle of a three-game losing streak for the Bulldogs.
Today's stakes are as simple as they get for Mississippi State: Win, and go to the NCAA Tournament. Lose, and probably go to the NIT. I know, I know: Some think there's an at-large case to be made for the Bulldogs in the event of a loss. The experts do not. For what it's worth, State's RPI is 65 this morning, according to warrennolan.com.
Will the Southeastern Conference only get two teams in? The numbers would seem to present that case, though longtime league followers you talk to down here just don't see it happening. And they present a pretty good ace in the hole: This year, the committee chairman is SEC commish Mike Slive.
So we shall see.
The selection show is on CBS at 5 CT today.
NIT pairings come out a few hours later.
In the meantime, join up with The Blog here in a couple of hours live from St. Pete Times Forum, on what has become the first cloudy day since I've been here.
Original Story:
http://www.clarionledger.com/apps/pbc...
