Patriot League
March 1, 3, 6, 9. All games at higher seed.
kPOY: Tim Kempton, Lehigh.

The Patriot League tournament gets started Tuesday night with first round action at Navy and Loyola.

Bucknell and Lehigh destroyed the conventional wisdom that a difficult non-conference schedule can crush a team’s mental fortitude. The two teams went a combined 3-17 against Division-I teams in non-conference play, but finished as the top two teams in the conference.

At one time, Lehigh was 6-14, but the Mountain Hawks enter the tournament 15-14 after winning their last nine. That’s nothing compared to American, though. The Eagles were 2-15 after losing their first six conference games, but they finished in a four-way tie for fourth after going 9-3 the rest of the way.

The PL plays all games at the higher seed and that makes Bucknell the clear favorite. Army, who was 3-6 in conference play before getting Tanner Plomb back from injury and finishing 9-9, has a realistic chance of ending its forever tournament drought. But the Black Knights will likely have to win two games on the road to do so.

                      Qtrs Semis Final Champ
 1 Bucknell            100  86.4  66.9  46.7
 2 Lehigh              100  75.7  58.3  28.5
 3 Boston University   100  84.1  29.3  11.5
 4 Army                100  69.0  21.2   6.7
 7 Navy               87.4  23.2   9.3   3.0
 5 Colgate             100  31.0   8.7   2.5
 8 Loyola MD          74.8  11.1   2.7   0.5
 6 American            100  15.9   2.9   0.4
 9 Holy Cross         25.2   2.5   0.4   0.05
10 Lafayette          12.6   1.1   0.2   0.02

Patriot League tourney records (since 1999)

American   23-11
Bucknell   24-13
Holy Cross 20-13
Lafayette  18-14
Lehigh     16-14
Boston U.   2- 2
Colgate     8-17
Army        5-17
Navy        4-17
Loyola MD   0- 3