March Madness in Illinois Part I: SIU Edwardsville

The Southern Illinois University Edwardsville Cougars have qualified for their first-ever NCAA tournament as Ohio Valley Conference Champions and will face #1 seed Houston tonight.

Though they are underdogs, their route to the tournament this year was fascinating.

How They Made It:

SIUE entered this year off the back of three straight disappointing seasons with all three ending with SIUE outside of the Top 5 of the OVC. Despite this, expectations were rather high again this year, with the team being projected to end in the Top 3 in the conference once again.

SIUE started the year with some tough “Guarantee Games” (matchups where a larger school pays a smaller school a significant sum to play a game, typically at the larger school’s home stadium, with no return game scheduled) with losses to both Indiana and Illinois. The team promptly bounced back, finishing their non-conference matchups 7-4 with inspiring performances by Ray’Sean Taylor, including 30 vs. Western Michigan in a 79-60 win.

This didn’t last as the team failed to win their first two conference games, leading to doubt once again. They responded with authority, going 13-5 through the rest of the conference slate, winning the conference semi-final with a narrow 71-69 win over Tennessee State and ultimately winning the final a day later vs. conference leaders SE Missouri State 69-48 after finishing the last 11 minutes on a 28-8 run.

Their Weaknesses:

SIU Edwardsville was one of the worst free throw shooting teams in the nation this year, shooting just 67.6% from the charity stripe, including going 18-28 in their conference championship.
SIUE’s depth this year wasn’t necessarily great, as they only had 3 players record over 7 PPG this year.

Their Strengths:

SIUE was one of the best rebounding teams in the entire country this year, with the Cougars pulling down an incredible 38.5 rebounds per game, enough to rank 32nd in the country. This includes the OVC final where they outrebounded SEMO 50-31.
With their good physicality in the paint, the Cougars also provide good defense, with four blocks per game ranking them inside the nation’s Top 90 teams.