For many Division I basketball teams — the ones you don’t hear about until this time of year, the ones whose conferences rarely if ever send more than one team to the big dance — it’s the most important week of the season.
Winning your conference tournament means earning that precious automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament.
Take last year’s University of Maryland-Baltimore County Retrievers team. They were the second seed in the America East Tournament, but defeated No. 1 Vermont to advance to the national tournament — then defeated a much greater No. 1, Virginia, the next week.
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As of Sunday afternoon, this is the list of all 32 conference tournament champions who punched their ticket:
Results
Saturday, March 9:
Ohio Valley champion: Murray State (77-65 win over Belmont)
Sunday, March 10:
Atlantic Sun champion: Liberty (74-68 win over Lipscomb)
Big South champion: Gardner-Webb (76-65 win over Radford)
Missouri Valley champion: Bradley (57-54 win over Northern Iowa)
Monday, March 11:
MAAC champion: Iona (81-60 win over Monmouth)
Southern champion: Wofford (70-58 win over UNC Greensboro)
Tuesday, March 12:
Colonial Athletic champion: Northeastern (82-74 win over Hofstra)
Horizon champion: Northern Kentucky (77-66 win over Wright State)
Northeast champion: Fairleigh Dickinson (85-76 over St. Francis PA)
Summit champion: North Dakota State (73-63 win over Omaha)
West Coast champion: St. Mary’s (60-47 win over Gonzaga)
Wednesday, March 13:
Patriot champion: Colgate (94-80 win over Bucknell)
Saturday, March 16:
ACC champion: Duke (73-63 win over Florida State)
America East champion: Vermont (66-49 win over UMBC)
Big 12 champion: Iowa State (78-66 win over Kansas)
Big East champion: Villanova (74-72 win over Seton Hall)
Big Sky champion: Montana (68-62 win over Eastern Washington)
Big West champion: UC Irvine (92-64 win over Cal State Fullerton)
C-USA champion: Old Dominion (62-56 win over Western Kentucky)
Mid-American champion: Buffalo (87-73 win over Bowling Green)
MEAC champion: North Carolina Central (50-47 over Norfolk State)
Mountain West champion: Utah State (64-57 win over San Diego State)
Pac-12 champion: Oregon (68-48 win over Washington)
Southland champion: Abilene Christian (77-60 win over New Orleans)
SWAC champion: Prairie View A&M (92-86 win over Texas Southern)
WAC champion: New Mexico State (89-57 win over Grand Canyon)
Sunday, March 17:
American champion: Cincinnati (69-57 win over Houston)
Atlantic 10 champion: St. Louis (55-53 win over St. Bonaventure)
Big Ten champion: Michigan State (55-50 win over Michigan)
Ivy champion: Yale (97-85 win over Harvard)
SEC champion: Auburn (84-64 win over Tennessee)
Sun Belt champion: Georgia State (73-64 win over UT-Arlington)
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