Eight days and one regular season game away from the Big West Conference Tournament, the Long Beach State men’s basketball team is not getting complacent with the No. 1 seed secured.
Head coach Dan Monson won’t let his players relax — and that should have all but one of the three teams battling for the final two seeds pleased.
Monson is doing the right thing, and it’s not necessarily about the seventh and eighth seeds.
Unless, of course, you are UC Riverside; one of the three teams that also happens to be the 49ers’ opponent in their season finale Wednesday. Tipoff at the UCR Student Recreation Center is scheduled for 8 p.m.
“We’re asking these kids to win and you have to coach the same way,” Monson said after the ‘Niners defeated UC Santa Barbara last Saturday.
What’s at stake for LBSU?
The NCAA selection committee looks at a team’s entire résumé — “quality” wins, “bad” losses, Ratings Percentage Index — when determining its seed for the 68-team NCAA Tournament.
RPI helps compare teams from different conferences using a formula that takes into account a team’s winning percentage and strength of schedule.
Now, granted, the 49ers still have to win the conference tournament to receive an automatic bid into the Big Dance. But even the most meaningless of regular-season losses — see, Loyola Marymount in late November — could make a difference between a No. 15 seed and a No. 14 seed.
Should LBSU run the table between now and the Big West Tournament finals, that will give the team a 12-game winning streak heading into Selection Sunday and give the committee a reason to think a little.
And if Monson’s track record of not settling means anything, then the fourth-year head coach could be looking at the big NCAA Tournament picture to put his team in the best position possible. After all, that is why he scheduled Top 25-caliber nonconference opponents the past two seasons.
ESPN bracketologist Joe Lunardi currently has The Beach listed as a 15-seed playing No. 2 Texas.
Why not rest the starters?
Monson said he is not going to use Wednesday’s game as a chance to cut his starters’ minutes. Junior forward Eugene Phelps averages 29 minutes per game while the other four starters average more than 32.5 per contest.
“We don’t want to go into that tournament with any lack of confidence or any lack of sharpness,” Monson said. “So we’re gonna go to Riverside and play like we do every game.
“And if [Casper Ware] needs to play 40 minutes to do that, he’ll rest a month from now.”
Ware, the team’s junior point guard and arguably the leading Big West Player of the Year candidate, has had a history of cramping in both calves during games throughout his collegiate career.
How can the 49ers shake up the standings?
The Highlanders (10-17, 5-9 Big West) are jockeying for not only a spot in the conference tournament, but the No. 7 seed as well. UCR is tied with Cal State Fullerton (9-19, 5-9 Big West) while UC Davis (9-19, 3-11 Big West) currently sits as the odd team out of the eight-team tournament.
Davis, which has no margin for error, would need to win its remaining two games and have CSUF lose its final two games just to get in the Big West Tournament.
Meanwhile, LBSU (19-10, 13-2 Big West) will have an effect on the race — win or lose. It is also possible that UCR could finish eighth, which would put the 49ers and Highlanders against each other March 10 in the first round of the Big West Tournament in Anaheim.
So, the ‘Niners can also send a message to UCR with a win, or possibly give the Highlanders a dangerous boost of confidence should they meet again.
Regardless, The Beach already knows it will play the No. 8 seed at noon that day at the Honda Center.
Awards watch
The Big West will announce its all-conference team selections and individual award winners next Monday.
The awards are voted on by the league’s nine head coaches.
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