Northeast Conference
March 2, 5, 8. All games at higher seed.
kPOY: Michael Carey, Wagner.

The NEC tournament starts Wednesday night with home court action at four locations.

The NEC is one of the few conferences that restricts its field. The ten-team league only invites its top eight to the post-season festivities. That ratio is better than the 1980’s NHL so maybe we shouldn’t feel sorry for the pair of teams that didn’t make it. (Sorry, Bryant and Central Connecticut) But for some teams, it truly is an achievement to make the tournament. Take St. Francis – the Pennsylvania variety – who is making just its ninth appearance over the past 18 seasons.

The clear favorite is Wagner who went 13-5 in conference play and if it wasn’t for the Seahawks’ existence, the NEC would have as much parity as any conference around. Teams seeded two through eight are fairly equal, with the home-court format providing most of the spread in probabilities. Given that home teams were 45-45 in NEC play this season, my flat home-court advantage scheme may be a bit too generous to the favorites.

The kPOY race in the NEC was similarly up for grabs. (The league’s official award is going to go to Sacred Heart’s Cane Broome.) Wagner’s Michael Carey is the pick to this point, which is interesting because he didn’t even start nine games this season. Given that he’s listed at 6-5, 190, and finished in the top 100 nationally in both offensive and defensive rebounding percentage, I endorse my computer’s pick. And if Carey hangs on to it in tournament play that would make two players from the Bahamas winning a conference kPOY this season.

                      Semis Final Champ
 1 Wagner              88.4  74.9  63.0
 2 Fairleigh Dickinson 71.5  48.3  14.3
 3 Sacred Heart        64.8  27.3   7.2
 4 St. Francis NY      63.4  21.7   6.8
 5 Mount St. Mary's    36.6  13.1   4.3
 6 LIU Brooklyn        35.2   7.4   2.2
 7 St. Francis PA      28.5   4.1   1.3
 8 Robert Morris       11.6   3.1   0.9

NEC tourney records (since 1999)

Mount St. Mary’s 16- 9
Robert Morris    21-12
LIU Brooklyn     11- 9
C. Connecticut   15-13
F. Dickinson      7- 9
Wagner           10-13
Sacred Heart      5- 7
St. Francis NY    8-14
Bryant            1- 3
St. Francis PA    2- 8