City of Basketball Love

Josh Verlin (@jmverlin)
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With the NCAA Tournament’s Selection Sunday show stretched out to two hours, three local teams had to do a little extra waiting to find out their March Madness fates.

Villanova and Saint Joseph’s didn’t need to sweat out the Selection Show, as the two programs had already punched their tickets to the Dance. The Wildcats were in thanks to a 29-5 season that had them ranked No. 1 in the country for several weeks, and St. Joe’s with its Atlantic 10 championship earlier Sunday--though the Hawks (27-7) were a clear at-large selection anyways.

The only team in the area that was on the bubble heading into Sunday was Temple, which was one of several teams with uncertain fates on an unusually large bubble. The Owls, which went 21-11, were the American Athletic Conference’s regular-season champions (14-4) but were 6-6 in non-league games and lost to UConn in the AAC semifinal on Saturday.

But the Owls found out their fate 25 minutes in, getting the No. 10 seed in the South region as they’re headed to their first NCAA tournament since 2013. They'll play the Iowa Hawkeyes (21-10) in the first round.

"I was up most of the night just thinking about it," senior wing Quenton DeCosey said. "I woke up early this morning, still thinking about it. I couldn’t wait until 5:30 to see if we’d get called or not. It’s just an unbelievable feeling."

This time a year ago, Temple watched the entire show without seeing its name come up, despite a 23-win season that saw them also fall short in the league semifinals. It was a feeling that lingered all year long, and intensified after the Owls weren't able to get it done in the AAC tournament this time around.

“Last year we thought we had a good enough season, so we didn’t want to take anything for granted this year," senior forward Jaylen Bond said. 'We felt like we had a good enough year and we were happy to get our names called.”

Villanova earned the No. 2 seed in the South region, falling just short of earning a No. 1 seed for the second consecutive season after losing to Seton Hall in the Big East final on Saturday. The Wildcats, making their fourth trip to the dance in a row and 11th time in the last 12 years, get UNC-Asheville (22-11) in the first round.

"As long as we’re in the tournament playing someone, we’ll be happy to play Villanova Basketball," senior point guard Ryan Arcidiacono said. "Just taking it one game at a time. Hopefully we can get better in these next couple days in practice and try to get a win up in Brooklyn. We’re going to focus on the next game after that, if we make it."

The Wildcats were hoping to be in the East region, which would have given them a chance to play at the Wells Fargo Center in the Sweet 16 and Elite 8, but instead that spot went to Xavier--which finished behind 'Nova in the regular-season standings and lost to Seton Hall in the Big East semis.

“I’m sure a lot of the fans were probably disappointed," head coach Jay Wright said. "Everybody here in our Philly contingent probably anticipated in being in Philly. We had our chances. We had to win the game last night, but we didn’t do it.

“It is, we had our chance," he added. "I’m confident that if we win that game last night, we would have been in Philadelphia. We didn’t, and it’s all part of the season, how you handle that."

If both Temple and Villanova win their first-round games in Brooklyn next Friday, they’ll play each other in the second round on Sunday.

Other top seeds in the South include 3-seed Miami (Fl.), 4-seed Cal, 5-seed Maryland and 6-seed Arizona.

Whichever teams wins their first two games will advance to the South regional, which will be held in Louisville from March 24-27; also in the South region is the No. 1 overall team in the tournament, Kansas (30-4).

St. Joe's didn't have to wait much longer to find out its fate, getting placed as the No. 8 seed in the West region, where it will face No. 9 Cincinnati (22-10) on Friday in Spokane, Washington. The winner of that game will most likely get No. 1 seed Oregon (28-6) that Sunday.