Richard Pitino and his Gophers saw their final goal of a major turnaround come to fruition Sunday evening when the NCAA Tournament selection committee gave them a surprisingly high No. 5 seed. Minnesota plays No. 12 seed Middle Tennessee in Milwaukee on Thursday in South Region action.
This is Minnesota's first trip to the NCAA Tournament under Pitino, and the program's first Big Dance in four years. In 2013, the Gophers made the tournament and beat UCLA before losing to Florida in the second round. Tubby Smith was fired as coach after that loss, and Pitino was hired shortly after.
The 2013 victory over UCLA is Minnesota's only NCAA Tournament victory, officially, in over 20 years. The Gophers are 1-4 in the tourney this millennium. The program's Final Four run in 1997 has since been wiped off the official books due to NCAA violations.
The Minnesota-MTSU winner will play the winner of the game between No. 4 seed Butler and No. 13 Winthrop on Saturday.
This March, the Gophers beat Michigan State on Friday in the quarterfinals of the Big Ten tournament, but then lost to eventual tourney champ Michigan in the semifinals on Saturday afternoon. The Gophers enter the tourney with 24 victories.
The Blue Raiders of Middle Tennessee are 30-4 after winning the Conference USA tournament. Memorably, MTSU beat Michigan State in last year's tournament, a shocking 15-seed-over-a-2-seed upset. MTSU was ranked No. 25 in the poll after the regular season and had a chance to make the tournament even if it would have lost in the Conference USA tourney.
The Blue Raiders took all the doubt out of it by beating Marshall 83-72 victory for their second straight C-USA title.
"For us to be able to do that in the fashion we did it, it really speaks volumes about our team and what we had to go through over the season and not just being satisfied with what we did last year," Middle Tennessee senior Reggie Upshaw Jr. said.
In other notable Big Ten seeds: Wisconsin got a surprisingly low seed, No. 8 seed in the East. The Badgers would play top-seed Villanova if they win. Regular-season champ Purdue got a 4 seed, and Big Ten tourney champ Michigan got an 7.
