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Neutral Colors
For the 11th-straight season, the Missouri Valley Conference Women’s Basketball Tournament will be played at a neutral site after using institutional home arenas as hosts for the first 22 league tournaments. Just six Division I conferences conduct stand-alone neutral site women’s basketball tournaments (Big Ten, Big 12, ACC, SEC, Pac-12 and MVC).
Valley History
One of the premier women’s basketball leagues in the country, the MVC has seen an average of four league teams participate in postseason play in the last 20 seasons. The Valley has earned multiple NCAA Tournament bids in 11 different seasons, including a pair of bids to last season’s NCAA Tournament. The league has also had two Final Four teams (Missouri State, in both 1992 and 2001), a WNIT champion (Missouri State, 2005) and three WNIT semifinal appearances (Illinois State, in 2011, 2010 and 2009).
Best Spot
The top seed has won the conference tournament in 18 of 32 seasons and a team that has won or shared the regular-season title has gone on to win the tournament title 21 times. Top seeds have five runner-up finishes.
Teams seeded No. 2 have won the tournament five times and finished as the runner-up 12 times.
Missouri State was the first No. 3 seed to win the tournament title in 2016. The No. 3 seed has been a runner-up eight times.
Teams seeded No. 4 have won three times, while the No. 8 seed has won twice. Seeds No. 5 (UNI, 2010), No. 7 (Missouri State, 2006) and No. 9 (Evansville, 2009) have won the tournament just once.
Worst Spot
Seeds No. 6 and No. 10 have yet to win an MVC Tournament. Teams seeded sixth have just one runner-up finish. The No. 10 seed has won just three MVC Tournament games in league history (No. 10 Wichita State defeated No. 7 Missouri State in 2009, 52-51; No. 10 Southern Illinois defeated No. 7 Evansville in 2013, 83-74 in overtime; No. 10 Evansville defeated No. 7 Illinois State in 2016, 61-59 ot).
Chalk It Up
Since the league moved to a neutral-site tournament in St. Charles in 2007-08, just three times have the top-four seeds in the bracket advanced to semifinal Saturday of the championship – in 2013, the bracket produced chalk with top-four seeds Wichita State, Creighton, Illinois State and UNI – in 2008 (Illinois State, Evansville, Drake and Creighton) - and 2016 (UNI, Drake, Missouri State and Southern Illinois).
Three of the top-four seeds advanced to Saturday in 2009 and 2015, while only two of the top-four seeds advanced in 2010, 2011, 2012, 2014 and 2017.
Unlucky No. 1?
Since the 2000-01 season, the No. 1 seed has won the MVC Tournament just seven times (2002, 2004, 2008, 2011, 2013, 2015, 2017). 10 winners of the tournament came from a seed other than the No. 1 seed.
When They’re All Here
Here’s a look at how teams have fared, by seed, since the tournament expanded to include all 10 teams in 2006:
Seed W L Best Result
No. 1 22 7 2008, 2011, 2013, 2015 & 2017 Champion
No. 2 13 11 2014 Champion
No. 3 14 11 2016 Champion
No. 4 10 11 2012 Champion
No. 5 7 11 2010 Champion
No. 6 5 12 2007 Final
No. 7 16 11 2006 Champion
No. 8 8 12 2007 Champion
No. 9 10 11 2009 Champion
No. 10 3 12 2009 & 2013 Quarterfinal
Unlikely Repeat
Just six times in conference history has there been a repeat winner of the MVC Tournament. Missouri State won four-straight titles from 1991 through 1994, while Wichita State won three consecutive titles from 2013-15. Drake won back-to-back championships in 1997 and 1998, Missouri State repeated in 2003 and 2004 and UNI accomplished the feat in 2010 and 2011. Drake is looking to repeat for the second time in program history.
Top of the Heap
Missouri State has won the most MVC Tournament titles (10) of any Valley school, claiming their last title in 2016. Drake has claimed six tournament titles and Illinois State has four tournament championships, including the league’s first tournament in 1983.
Evansville, UNI and Southern Illinois each have two MVC Tournament titles in program history.
Bradley, Indiana State, Loyola and first-year member Valparaiso are the only four Valley schools not to have earned a tournament championship.
The last time a Valley school defended its tournament title was when Wichita State won three consecutive MVC Tournament titles (2013, 2014, 2015).
There’s Always a Chance
The lowest-seeded team to ever win the MVC Tournament was the No. 9 Evansville Purple Aces squad in 2009. Previously, there were a pair of No. 8 seeds – Illinois State in 2005 and Drake in 2007 – to claim MVC Tournament titles. Just one No. 7 seed (Missouri State in 2006) has ever won the MVC Tournament title.
Separation Factor
Since the start of the 1992-93 season when the Gateway Conference merged with the Missouri Valley Conference, the regular-season title has been decided by just one game on 11 occasions. In 2011, when UNI won the league with a 17-1 record, the Panthers became the first MVC team to win the regular-season title by five games, as their closest opponents (Illinois State, Missouri State and Creighton) all featured league records of 12-6.
Six times the league title has been won by a three-game margin, three times by two games, 11 times by one game and five times by identical winning records. This season, Drake (18-0) secured the regular-season league title by three games over second-place Missouri State (15-3).
RPI Update
The latest installment of the NCAA RPI Report (Mar. 4) has four Valley teams that rank in the top-175, led by Drake at No. 70, Missouri State at No. 97, UNI at 135 and Southern Illinois at 171.
Scheduled Tough
Missouri State leads the league with a non-conference strength of schedule of 11. Three other league schools, including Drake (No. 12), UNI (No. 33) and Southern Illinois (60), also have schedules that rank in the top-60. The Valley is one of seven leagues to have at least four teams appearing in the Top 50, joining the ACC, Big East, Big Ten, Pac 12, SEC and Southland.
WBB Player/Newcomer of the Week
This week's Missouri Valley Conference Women's Basketball Player/Newcomer of the Week are UNI's Megan Maahs and Illinois State's Simone Goods, respectively. Maahs earns her first Player of the Week honor of the season, while Goods tallied her third Newcomer of the Week award this season.
MISSOURI VALLEY CONFERENCE PLAYER OF THE WEEK:
Megan Maahs, So., F, UNI
Sophomore Megan Maahs posted back-to-back games in double-figures for the Panthers as UNI swept Valparaiso and Loyola on the road to close out the regular season. Maahs record back-to-back double-doubles in the pair of contests as well, to add to her league-best 12 for the season. Maahs’ 12 double-doubles are the most at UNI since Alex Cook earned 13 in 2003-04. Maahs earned 13 points and 13 rebounds against the Crusaders, while posting 16 points and 10 rebounds against the Ramblers. Maahs has climbed up the all-time leaderboard at UNI to rank third for both total rebounds (294) and defensive rebounds (208) in a single season.
MISSOURI VALLEY CONFERENCE NEWCOMER OF THE WEEK:
Simone Goods, Jr., F, Illinois State
Goods led the Redbirds in Sunday’s 53-41 victory over the Bradley Braves adding 25 points, six boards and two blocks. Goods went 10-for-18 from the field, shooting 55 percent. This is the sixth time this season that the junior forward has scored 20 or more points in a game. This win also secured the sixth seed for the Valley tournament and it is the first time in five years that the team has finished in the top six.
Noteworthy - In addition to the league's player and newcomer of the week selections, several conference players had notable performances, and they include:
Sara Rhine (DU); Ashli O’Neal (INS); Tiara Wallace (LUC); Liza Fruendt (MSU); Nicole Martin (SIU); Maddie Monahan (DU); Brice Calip (MSU); Nicole Kroeger (UNI); Abby Brockmeyer (SIU)