CAPE GIRARDEAU, Mo. - Southeast Missouri will play host to Ball State in the 11th Annual ESPN Ramada Worldwide BracketBusters event. The Redhawks and Cardinals will meet at 7 p.m., CT, on Saturday Feb. 23 at the Show Me Center.
The Redhawks will face a Mid-American Conference opponent for the fourth time in their last six BracketBuster appearances.
"We are excited about playing Ball State from the Mid-American Conference," said Southeast head coach
Dickey Nutt. "Traditionally, Ball State has had a basketball name and we will welcome the series."
Southeast and BSU meet for the first time this year. The Redhawks will return the trip in the future once details are finalized.
The Redhawks are currently 11-13 overall and in a three-way tie for third in the Ohio Valley Conference West Division. Southeast will play both SIUE (Feb. 7) and Eastern Illinois (Feb. 9) at home, and travel to UT Martin (Feb. 16) and Jacksonville State (Feb. 20) before squaring off against the Cardinals in its final home game season.
BSU is presently 8-12 overall and last in the MAC's West Division with a 2-6 mark. The Cardinals are led by senior guard Jauwan Scaife who ranks 10th in the MAC with 13 points per game. BSU is last in the conference in free throw percentage (.640) and second-to-last with 15.2 turnovers a game.
Southeast, which is 1-6 all-time in BracketBuster games, are 0-4 against MAC opponents in such meetings.
The Redhawks matchup with BSU is one of nine non-television games featuring Ohio Valley Conference teams. The others include Austin Peay at Liberty, Eastern Illinois at Northern Illinois, Jacksonville State at UNC Asheville, Morehead State at Oakland, SIU Edwardsville at Central Arkansas, Loyola (Md.) at Tennessee State, UMKC at Tennessee Tech and Longwood at UT Martin.
The four OVC teams (Southeast Missouri, Tennessee State, Tennessee Tech, UT Martin) who will host non-TV BracketBusters games will have their matchups available for viewing live and for free on the OVC Digital Network.
Meanwhile, three OVC teams were awarded TV games for the first time. Those matchups, which will all be on Feb. 23, involve Eastern Kentucky at Valparaiso (ESPNU, Noon, CT), South Dakota State at Murray State (ESPN2, 7 p.m., CT) and Ohio at Belmont (ESPN2, 9 p.m., CT). The league never had more than one TV game per year prior to this season.
In its 11th year, Ramada Worldwide BracketBusters is an ESPN television property that was tremendously successful with its first 10 events in February of 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011 and 2012. The event has allowed Division I conferences to participate in a cutting-edge format that involves "wild card" pairings from the pool of participating teams, with half of the BracketBusters teams pre-designated as "home" and the remaining half as "road" teams.
What sets BracketBusters apart from the other made-for-television events is that the pairings of teams is not pre-determined. The actual pairings take place three weeks in advance of the event, and those matchups are determined on the basis of regular season play. Another important component for Ramada Worldwide BracketBusters participants is future scheduling. Each team that participates in any given year agrees to enter into a home-and-home series with its to-be-named opponent. The return game allows for the completion of the two-game series contract and is not part of the BracketBusters event in that second year.
The evaluation and pairings of teams for the ESPN television package are made by the staff of ESPN, in consultation with the commissioners of participating conferences. Consideration is given to avoiding matchups of conference teams and matchups of any teams that have already met during the current season.
ESPN announced in December this will be the final year of the BracketBusters event.
The OVC owns an all-time record of 32-45 in the ESPN BracketBusters. That mark includes a 21-16 record in home games and an 11-29 record in away contests.
ESPN Ramada Worldwide BracketBusters Site
