Eastern Kentucky falls short in conference tournament, but other state schools play on

Despite holding a 13-point first-half lead and shooting 52% from the field, Eastern Kentucky’s men’s basketball season came to an end Thursday night.

The No. 3-seed Colonels lost in the semifinals of the ASUN Tournament at No. 2 seed Liberty, 79-73, in Lynchburg, Va.

EKU will remain without an NCAA Tournament appearance since 2014. Unless the Colonels secure a bid to a secondary postseason tournament, they’ll end the 2022-23 season with a 20-13 record.

EKU was led by junior Devontae Blanton’s 23 points, but it wasn’t enough to overcome a high-scoring night from a pair of Liberty guards.

Liberty redshirt senior Darius McGhee had 29 points (21 of which came in the second half for the three-time ASUN Player of the Year), and freshman Colin Porter (who went to Ashland Blazer High School in Kentucky) posted a career-best 25 points.

The Colonels are yet to play in a conference tournament title game under head coach A.W. Hamilton, who has now spent five full seasons in Richmond.

The closest EKU has come to the NCAA Tournament under Hamilton has been conference tournament semifinal appearances in both the Ohio Valley Conference and the ASUN.

The ASUN’s automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament will be decided Sunday afternoon between No. 1 seed Kennesaw State and No. 2 seed Liberty. Kennesaw State will host the game.

Tracking Kentucky schools on the road to the NCAA Tournament

Not that long ago, it was truly a question if one of the most impressive factoids about the state of Kentucky would still hold true.

Since 1964, every NCAA men’s basketball Tournament has featured at least one team from the commonwealth.

Thoughts of that streak being in jeopardy have been quashed by Kentucky’s resurgence in recent weeks, but plenty of Kentucky-based schools still harbor hopes of qualifying for the 68-team NCAA Tournament field.

While Kentucky is just about a lock to receive an at-large bid to the Big Dance, the likes of Morehead State, Murray State, Northern Kentucky and others all still have pathways to the postseason through conference tournaments.

Here’s a check-in (in alphabetical order) with all eight NCAA Division I men’s basketball programs in Kentucky as the NCAA Tournament field comes into picture.

Bellarmine

▪ Record: 15-18 overall, 9-9 ASUN.

▪ Next game: N/A.

▪ NCAA Tournament outlook: None. Bellarmine was in the third season of its four-year transition period after moving from Division II to Division I. As such, head coach Scott Davenport’s Knights are still ineligible for the NCAA Tournament.

But unlike last year — when Bellarmine stunningly won the ASUN Tournament and the league’s automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament had to go to regular-season champion Jacksonville State — the Knights’ season has already come to an end.

No. 8 seed Bellarmine lost in the ASUN Tournament quarterfinals Tuesday night at No. 2 seed Liberty.

But before their season ended, the Knights provided the first buzzer-beating moment of conference tournament season.

In a first round ASUN Tournament win over North Florida on Monday night, graduate student guard Juston Betz made a turnaround jumper with 0.4 seconds left to win the game.

Eastern Kentucky

▪ Record: 20-13 overall, 12-6 ASUN.

▪ Next game: N/A.

▪ NCAA Tournament outlook: None. EKU’s season came to an end Thursday night with a loss at Liberty in the ASUN Tournament semifinals.

EKU will remain without an NCAA Tournament appearance since 2014.

Kentucky

Record: 20-10 overall, 11-6 SEC.

▪ Next game: at Arkansas, 2 p.m. Saturday.

▪ NCAA Tournament outlook: Kentucky has one game remaining before next week’s SEC Tournament in Nashville, and the Wildcats’ margin for error is back to being thin.

UK lost on Senior Night on Wednesday night at home to Vanderbilt, and potentially lost star freshman guard Cason Wallace for longer with a left leg injury.

A season-sweep over Tennessee highlights UK’s résumé, but Kentucky is back to worrying about possibly being a double-digit seed for the Big Dance.

Louisville

▪ Record: 4-26 overall, 2-17 ACC.

▪ Next game: at No. 13 Virginia, 2 p.m. Saturday.

▪ NCAA Tournament outlook: Louisville’s only hope of making the NCAA Tournament after a historically bad season is to win the ACC Tournament. It would be more likely for a meteor to strike Earth tomorrow.

Morehead State

▪ Record: 21-10 overall, 14-4 OVC.

▪ Next game: vs. Southeast Missouri State, 8 p.m. Friday.

▪ NCAA Tournament outlook: Outside of the Kentucky Wildcats, it’s the Morehead State Eagles that had the easiest and most direct path to an NCAA Tournament appearance.

Head coach Preston Spradlin guided a new-look Morehead State team to an outright Ohio Valley Conference regular season title this season, just the second time ever that MSU has won the OVC outright and the first time in 39 years.

The reward was the No. 1 seed for the OVC Tournament in Evansville, Indiana, which was to begin for Morehead State on Friday night against No. 5 seed Southeast Missouri State (SEMO).

Morehead State split a pair of games against SEMO this season: SEMO won by five at Morehead, and Morehead won by six at SEMO.

The Eagles only had to win two games in Evansville to win the OVC Tournament and reach the NCAA Tournament for the ninth time ever and the second time in three years.

Murray State

▪ Record: 17-15 overall, 11-9 MVC.

▪ Next game: N/A.

▪ NCAA Tournament outlook: None. The Racers’ season ended Friday night in the Missouri Valley Conference (MVC) Tournament quarterfinals: No. 7 seed Murray State lost to No. 2 seed Drake, 74-62.

It was a season of transition for the Racers after a switch in valleys from the Ohio Valley Conference to the Missouri Valley Conference.

Steve Prohm’s second turn as Murray State head coach saw Murray State win their first ever game in the MVC Tournament with a commanding win over Valparaiso before the defeat to Drake.

Prohm returned to Murray State after six seasons as the head coach at Iowa State.

During the 2021-22 season, Murray State went 18-0 in league play in its final season in the OVC before winning the OVC Tournament, as well as an NCAA Tournament first-round game against San Francisco.

Northern Kentucky

▪ Record: 20-12 overall, 14-6 Horizon League.

▪ Next game: vs. Youngstown State, 7 p.m. Monday.

▪ NCAA Tournament outlook: Northern Kentucky’s NCAA Tournament hopes hinge upon winning the Horizon League Tournament, so it’s a good thing the Norse have somewhat perfected this task.

Northern Kentucky has won the league tournament in three of the past six seasons and lost last season’s title game by just one point to Wright State.

This season, NKU is the No. 4 seed in the league tournament and took the first step toward another championship by defeating No. 5 seed Oakland, 81-74, at home Thursday night.

Next up for NKU is a tournament semifinal on Monday night against No. 1 seed Youngstown State, the regular-season champion of the Horizon League.

Youngstown State has never made the NCAA Tournament at the Division I level.

NKU junior guard Marques Warrick (Henry Clay) leads Northern Kentucky in minutes per game and points per game.

Western Kentucky

▪ Record: 16-14 overall, 7-11 Conference USA.

▪ Next game: at North Texas, 3 p.m. Saturday.

▪ NCAA Tournament outlook: Like Kentucky, Western Kentucky still has one more regular season game to go before the Conference USA Tournament in Frisco, Texas, next week.

The Hilltoppers’ 8-11 conference mark would leave WKU as a significant underdog in a conference tournament that will also feature both Florida Atlantic and North Texas, who are both in the top 52 of the NET rankings.

Western Kentucky hasn’t reached the NCAA Tournament since 2013.