The (11) Miami(OH) Redhawks(32-2) magical season came to an end on Friday in the first round of the Midwest Region at Xfinity Mobile Arena in Philadelphia, as they were routed by the (6)Tennessee Volunteers (23-11) 78-56.
Tennessee will face Virginia in the second round on Sunday.
After a slow start, the Volunteers began to separate themselves midway through the first half, and Tennessee, which led by as many as 20 points, took a 51-32 lead into halftime.
Ja’Kobi Gillespie led Tennessee with a game-high of 29 points and nine assists, 22 of which came in the first half.
Peter Suder led the Redhawks with 27 points.
After going 31-0 in the regular season, Miami(OH) lost to in the UMass in the quarterfinals of the MAC Tournament. They would make the tournament, but they had to beat SMU in the First Four to play Tennessee, which many thought was unfair considering their impressive record.
When you’re a mid-major team, it’s hard to get on the schedule of a Power 5 team. Miami (OH) coach Travis Steele discussed that issue after the loss.
“I think a lot of it is analytically driven,” Steele said. “I think there needs to be adjustments made to a lot of these, whatever you want to say, the analytical data or whatever, the KenPom or the predictive numbers, the net specific needs to be adjusted, right? I think you can always make things better. I don’t know when the last time they made an adjustment to it or if they have. Fans want to see those games. Our fans do, their fans do.
“They want to see brands. It went viral. I think Jonathan Holmes emails our staff. He’s in charge of scheduling; most scheduling is done over the phone. It’s frustrating. We didn’t finish our schedule until October, mid-October. We didn’t play until two weeks later, which is ridiculous. Especially in today’s college landscape, you want to stay away from quad two and quad three games. It does nothing for you. Nothing. It’s almost like a lose/lose situation if you’re them, so I get it. I think we may have moved up to a quad two, which hopefully will help us, but if you’re in that quad three range, man, good luck, you have no choice.”
According to Tennessee coach Rick Barnes, Miami(Oh) could beat some teams in the SEC.
“Miami of Ohio should have been the darlings, the talk of the tournament,” Barnes said. “You win 32 basketball games, I don’t care what league you play in. I don’t care what anybody says. And they would win some games in our league, make no bones about it.”
No matter how you feel about Miami (OH), it’s hard to go undefeated, and they did it in the regular season. Hopefully, for them and other mid-majors, they’ll get opportunities against the top teams in college basketball next season and beyond.
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