NCAA Tournament: Upsets to watch out for on lower seed lines
By Bryan Mauro
No. 12 seed: Murray State Racers
This is the first-round matchup that has college basketball fans salivating. Two of the best players in all of college basketball facing off against each other. Ja Morant from Murray State and Markus Howard from Marquette are two of the top 10 players in all of college basketball and both may be playing in the NBA very soon.
Murray State, out of the Ohio Valley, is more than Morant. They are a very good team who earned the auto bid from their conference. Outside of the superstar guard in Morant, the Racers have a huge body in the middle of the lane in Darnell Cowart. The 6-foot-8, 295-pound forward is a load and is going to give anyone he comes across trouble. The other player in the backcourt is senior Shaq Buchanon. He is the second fiddle to Morant but the two of them make a dynamic backcourt capable of doing damage.
Marquette has been reeling and enters the NCAA tournament losers of five out of their last six games. The one win coming in a whitewashing of St. Johns in the Big East tournament. Howard carries the load most nights for the Golden Eagles and when the rest of his team mainly Sacar Anim and Sam Hauser contribute they can light up a scoreboard. The Racers are going to be able to exploit some matchups in this game mainly in the paint and get some easy baskets. If Murray State can shut down the complimentary pieces to Howard, this win will be a lot easier to obtain. The Racers should win this game, however, it will be close. How close determines how much of an impact the Eagles other players not named Howard contribute.