Murray State

This past weekend the Murray State Racers lost in the championship game of the Ohio Valley Conference to the Belmont Bruins. Which means that the Belmont Bruins get the automatic bid for NCAA Tournament for Ohio Valley Conference. Unfortunately the Murray State Racers probably will not make the tournament despite being ranked as the 25th best team in the country prior to the game. By the time you guys finish reading this article I will convince that the logic behind keeping them out makes zero sense. One of the reasons to start as to why they should be in the tournament is the fact that they won 25 straight which was the second longest active winning streak in DI Men's  basketball only the undefeated Kentucky Wildcats have a longer streak. Also the obvious how do you go from being ranked in the top 25 to the committee according several bracketologist, people who specialize in predicting which teams will get in the field and which ones will not, leaving the Racers out completely. They also went undefeated in their regular season conference play. Which means they lose one game in the conference the entire year and suddenly they are not tournament material. There is no way that you can go from being in the top 25 one week and then someone coming to the conclusion that the team is no longer among the top 68 teams in DI basketball. The one thing that the Committee looks at is Basket Power Index (BPI) which is similar to a team's strength of schedule. Murray State's BPI is not that high because it does not make any sense for any top program to play them. This is because chances are the game would be a lot closer than many would like and if they were to lose to Murray State it would be seen as a bad lose just because of the other competition that Murray State plays in their conference. It is similar to when Boise State was really good in football and no one wanted to play them because they were afraid of losing. If Murray State was in the tournament they could very well get two or three wins especially with play from their stellar guard Cameron Payne. Also this team is 10th in the nation in scoring and 16th in field goal percentage. But it is expected that one of the worst shooting teams in the county in Temple will make the field. That makes total sense. I believe if Temple gets in they will be one and done where if you gave Murray State a shot they would win multiple games. Winning your conference in the regular season has to mean something for these mid majors because it seems that every year a lesser tier team gets hot in the post season tournament and wins it and takes away a deserving bid from the most dominant team that season in the conference and then that teams goes out and gets demolished in the tournament. Which to me  says there has to be change in this system because the mid majors are not always represented in the tournament by its best team.