Champ Week tips off with Rider’s stunner and Seton Hall’s squeaker

Rutgers + Seton Hall + Princeton + a MAAC champion? It could be a magical March for New Jersey.

March has arrived in the Garden State.

I set out to write a newsletter about New Jersey college hoops this season for several reasons, but chief among them was the fact that several teams looked plain good. Rutgers was coming off an important season for the growth of its program, Seton Hall was back on its way up and Princeton was returning to the court stronger than most Ivy rivals after a year away.

But probably none of us had pegged Rider as a team to make noise in March. Which is precisely the beauty of March.

I told you about the Broncs and the wonderful belief March instills in teams like them last time we were here. Truth is, the signs were there on paper. Rider closed its season strong, rising out of the MAAC basement with a number of wins and close losses, including to Iona on Feb. 27. Iona, meanwhile, was no longer invincible, having taken three MAAC losses by season’s end to scrub some luster off the “Rick Pitino” of it all.

Cut to Wednesday’s quarterfinal. The No. 9 seed beats the No. 1 on a late 7-0 run.

“When we win this whole thing, it’s going to shock the whole world,” Dwight Murray Jr. told reporters after.

Murray was heroic in the final minute, expertly keeping his pivot foot on the hardwood as he twisted around before hitting the game-winning shot. There’s no arguing the Broncs got lucky, as well, with Iona missing the front half of a one-and-one late in the game and going 10-for-15 from the foul line overall.

Murray finished with 21 points, eight assists and four rebounds. Not too shabby for a 6-foot point guard.

What comes next? Only Rider’s first appearance in the MAAC semifinals since 2011. This is not a program with tons of history, particularly this millennium, with just the 2018 regular-season MAAC title to show in the trophy case. (They last played in the NCAA Tournament in 1994.) The opponent, the context and the way it came to pass all combine to make Rider’s win Wednesday its biggest moment in recent memory.

It also has a terrific secondary effect on the rest of the MAAC Tournament and for the rooting interests of this state. You see, there are still six New Jersey programs still alive and kicking this month, and now that Rider is into the semis and playing with house money, it’s time to declare that any of those six have a realistic shot to make it to March Madness.

The maximum is four, and this was the best-case scenario all along, a simple formula of Rutgers + Seton Hall + Princeton + a MAAC champion. Princeton will need to win Ivy Madness this weekend, Rutgers can’t slip to the wrong side of the bubble, and either Rider, Saint Peter’s or Monmouth would take the fourth spot as the MAAC tourney champ.

How realistic is that? More so now that Rider advanced and Saint Peter’s took care of business Wednesday. Luke Benz, a frequent contributor of analytical college basketball projections over at @recspecs730, had his algorithm show Iona as the favorite to win (47.8% chances) as of the quarterfinals. Saint Peter’s ranked second at 24% and Monmouth was third at 10%. With Iona out of the way, Saint Peter’s becomes the heavy favorite at 51.8%, and there’s an incredible 81.1% chance one of the three N.J. teams wins the championship and the auto bid.

The Peacocks, now the highest remaining seed at No. 2, took a 44-19 halftime lead over Fairfield and skipped to a 77-63 win in Wednesday’s late game. KC Ndefo did KC Ndefo things – 20 points, two steals, three blocks. Saint Peter’s will face the winner of Siena-Quinnipiac and Rider will get the winner of Monmouth-Niagara.

If Monmouth beats Niagara late Thursday night, it will ensure at least one Jersey team will be in Saturday’s final in Atlantic City. I don’t have an algorithm, but I like those odds.

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Thanks for stopping by. A few quick notes on where everything else stands as of Thursday morning:

• Seton Hall. Whew, boy. You sure made it close. Look, anyone who has watched a bit of Georgetown basketball lately knows that the Hoyas are more talented than their record. I’ll stop short of saying “better” than their record, because if they should have won a Big East game by now then maybe the coaching is what’s held them back. But the fact of the matter is 6-25 Georgetown threatened to topple Seton Hall for the second time in eight days, and that doesn’t reflect super well on the Pirates!

• The takeaway from last night’s Big East battle has to be the interior. Seton Hall can rebound when it wants to; it has a plus-4.4 rebounding margin on the year. Yet the Hoyas thoroughly dominated the boards in the first half 28-16, with 11 second-chance points to Seton Hall’s none. Opponents know by now that the Pirates’ offense runs through guards and wings – Jared Rhoden, Myles Cale, Kadary Richmond, Jamir Harris and formerly Bryce Aiken. Ike Obiagu is a shot-blocking specialist but rarely scores. Tray Jackson operates better from the outside than inside. So the onus falls on Alexis Yetna. The truth is that Big East teams have found ways to slow him down and he’s no longer scoring with lots of consistency. Rebounding also falls on his shoulders, as Seton Hall would have lost last night without his 11 boards. For all the talk about how strong the Pirates used to be with Aiken scoring at will, they were also stronger when Yetna was producing double-doubles almost every game back around January.

• Upcoming schedule: Seton Hall plays No. 20 UConn, the third seed, late Thursday night. The winner will meet either second seed Villanova or suddenly surging St. John’s. This is truly the tougher side of the Big East bracket. The winner of No. 24 Iowa-Northwestern will be Rutgers’ opponent Friday in Indianapolis, so keep an eye on that one this afternoon. Scarlet Knights fans should probably pray that the Hawkeyes have cooled off since the regular season ended. And Monmouth’s quarterfinal game against Niagara tips at 9:30 tonight.

• Finally, a big reveal I’ve been sitting on for too long now... I’m taking this show on the road and heading to Harvard this weekend to cover Ivy Madness. I have some exciting things in store, likely including one extra edition of Guarden State between now and the Selection Show. I’ll be giving you my best and I hope you follow along!