NCAA Tournament March Madness

#290 North Dakota

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Projection: need to automatically qualify

North Dakota’s résumé is shaped by a handful of convincing road wins and a much longer list of damaging blowouts, so it makes sense that the team’s ticket to the NCAA tournament would have to come through the Summit League’s automatic berth. Road victories at Oral Roberts, Denver and at St Thomas and home wins over South Dakota and a hard-fought result against Winthrop show the team can win away from its own gym and close games, but those positives are undermined by heavy defeats at Alabama, Creighton and Nebraska and ugly losses at Hawaii and Idaho along with an early slip to UC Riverside that leaves little margin for error. With a final regular-season matchup against Missouri KC followed by league road trips to S Dakota St and N Dakota St, there are still chances to improve the profile, but the body of work as it stands explains why the safest path is to secure the league’s automatic ticket.

Date Opponent Ranking Outcome
11/3@Alabama16L91-62
11/6UC Riverside277L74-70
11/9CS Northridge178L93-85
11/15@UC Riverside277W76-74
11/19@Creighton78L75-60
11/22(N)Coastal Car232L75-58
11/23@W Illinois361W78-69
11/28@Hawaii91L92-55
12/3@Idaho179L90-58
12/6Montana158L79-75
12/13W Illinois361L69-66
12/18Winthrop132W90-88
12/21@Nebraska11L78-55
1/1Oral Roberts332W72-61
1/3S Dakota St219W90-87
1/8@NE Omaha251L90-79
1/10@Missouri KC352W81-79
1/15St Thomas MN121L91-80
1/17South Dakota282W96-80
1/22@Oral Roberts332W79-62
1/24@Denver221W93-86
1/29@St Thomas MN121W81-80
2/5NE Omaha251W76-73
2/7Denver221L98-79
2/11@South Dakota282W72-71
2/14N Dakota St126L83-66
2/19Missouri KC35282%
2/21@S Dakota St21926%
2/28@N Dakota St12612%