Atlantic 10 Conference (conference rank: 8th)
March 9-12
All games at Pittsburgh, Pa.
kPOY: TJ Cline, Richmond
Regular season champ: Dayton (preseason #37 / 2nd American, current #34)
Overachiever: George Mason (preseason #171, current #115)
Underachiever: Saint Joseph’s (preseason #99, current #173)

Here are the national leaders in assist percentage for players listed at 6-8 or taller (minimum 40% of team’s minutes):

1. Cline, Richmond          39.2
2. Gettings, Cornell        24.7
3. Taylor, Toledo           24.5
4. Davenport, North Florida 24.3
5. Happ, Wisconsin          24.0

Richmond’s TJ Cline ranks 11th overall in assist rate and at 6-9 blows away the field for assist rate honors among very tall people. Such are the possibilities playing the post in the Chris Mooney’s Princeton-ish offense. Although it’s taken time for Cline to get here. His first season in Richmond, he assisted on just 18% of his teammates buckets which rose to 28% last season.

But TJ Cline is a footnote to the 2017 A-10 season. Dayton overcame a tragic offseason to win the regular season title and VCU looks like it will join them in the NCAA tournament regardless of what happens in Pittsburgh. Rhode Island could possibly play its way in without winning the conference tournament, but the Rams have good reason to believe they can get the auto-bid, too. Richmond is the fourth team with a bye to the quarterfinals and the Spiders have an outside shot at a title, too.

                       Rd1  Qtrs Semis Final Champ
 1 Dayton              100   100  74.1  45.2  28.8
 2 VCU                 100   100  76.8  54.3  28.2
 4 Rhode Island        100   100  71.1  36.0  20.9
 3 Richmond            100   100  65.0  25.6   8.9
 9 Davidson            100  64.1  19.2   7.9   3.5
 5 St. Bonaventure     100  67.4  22.6   7.8   3.3
 7 George Mason        100  66.4  17.9   8.4   2.5
 6 George Washington   100  67.4  27.2   8.5   2.4
 8 La Salle            100  35.9   6.7   1.9   0.6
10 Fordham             100  33.6   5.4   1.7   0.3
14 Duquesne           68.0  25.2   6.7   1.3   0.2
12 Massachusetts      54.3  18.3   3.6   0.7   0.2
13 Saint Joseph's     45.7  14.3   2.7   0.5   0.1
11 Saint Louis        32.0   7.4   1.1   0.1   0.009